917.73463 
 M589J 
 
 MILBURN 
 
 JACKSONVILLE 125 YEARS AGO
 
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 LIBRARY OF THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS 
 
 AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN 
 
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 M589J 
 
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 ILJJUfOIS 
 
 BIBTOBJCAL 
 
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 UNIVERSITY OF 
 
 ILLINOIS LIBRARY 
 
 AT URBANA-CHAMPAIQN 
 
 tLINOIS HISTORICAL SURVEY 
 
 iL'i^ llltiloniCAL SFRVET
 
 JACKSONVILLE 
 
 125 
 Years Ago 
 
 WILLIAM H. MILBURN 
 
 With Introduction 
 
 by 
 
 CLARENCE P. McCLELLAND 
 
 -f 
 
 JACKSONVILLE, ILLINOIS 
 
 1955
 
 JACKSONVILLE 
 
 125 
 Years Ago 
 
 by 
 
 WILLIAM H. MILBURN 
 
 With Introduction 
 by 
 
 CLARENCE P. McCLELLAND
 
 WILLIAM H. MILBURN 
 1823-1903
 
 
 NBS'ff 
 
 INTRODUCTION 
 
 ONE of the most fitted and interesting Illinois men of the nineteenth 
 century was William H. Milburi^. Altht>UKh blind from boyhcxxl, 
 he acquired a broad culture, and because an orator of unusual 
 power. As a lecturer he was very popular. Knh in the United States and 
 Great Britain. Amon^ his friends were many of the most distint;uished 
 statesmen, writers, clergymen, and businessmen of his time. He was on 
 particularly friendly terms with Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and 
 Thomas Carlyle. He published four books which were tJi>od sellers in 
 America and England. It is hardly an exaggeration to say that Milbuni 
 avcled farther and during his lifetime was known to more people. man\ 
 t them eminent in the English-speaking world, than any other perst>n 
 <. cntral Illinois has prcxiuccd; and no man knew life i>n the middle 
 western frontier better or has written about it more interestingly. 
 
 .Mr. Milburn was born in Philadelphia on September 26, 1823. the 
 child of well-to-do and respected parents. When he was five years old 
 through a singular accident, he became blind and never again save in 
 imagination and memory saw the beauty of the physical world; and 
 toward the end oi his long life he said. "I never saw the face of anyt^ne to 
 
 >^ whom I spoke although I have preached and lectured for more than half 
 
 ,. a Century." 
 
 In 1838 the Milburn family moved to Jacksonville. Illinois. They made 
 
 ^ their home in a modest dwelling on East State Street almost directh 
 
 I opposite the front entrance to MacMurray College. The father opened .i 
 
 small store on the Square, and during rfu- r«-in:iitul<T .if l»is lifr u:ts one 
 
 f Jacksonville's leading citizens. 
 
 William was fifteen years of age at this time and every spare minuti 
 
 hat he could find he spent on his books. His father, realizing that thc 
 
 iniy would never be satisfied with anything less than a college education. 
 
 employed a tutor for him and in the autumn of 1839 he entered Ilhnois 
 
 c i>llege. For three years studying under the most trying cot^ditions. he 
 
 13]
 
 was able to keep up with his class, but in his senior year his health broke 
 and he was obliged to leave his studies and live an outdoor life. 
 
 Illinois College, because of the rapid progress he made in theological 
 and other studies, made him a member of the Class of 1845 and gave him 
 his Bachelor's degree. In 1891 the College conferred upon him the honorary 
 degree of Master of Arts and in 1894 the degree of Doctor of Divinity. 
 
 He served as Chaplain of Congress (both Houses) in 1845 and 1846 
 and again in 1853 and 1854. During the first Cleveland administration he 
 became Chaplain of the House of Representatives serving continuously 
 rhere until 1892 and in 1893 was elected Chaplain of the Senate. He 
 remained in this position until his death in 1903. 
 
 The following paragraphs are taken from Chapter XXIV of Milburn's 
 longest book, The Lance, Cross and Canoe; The Flatboat, Rifle and Plough, 
 published in 1892. They describe Jacksonville as it was about one hundred 
 twenty-five years ago. 
 
 V^^ fr> >u.^» <■< \J . 
 
 4]
 
 A Look Backward 
 
 IN my fifteenth year my father and his family removed from Philadelphi 
 to Illinois, which was then the far West, for only a few scattere 
 settlemei\ts had been made berweei^ the Great River aiui the Pacifi 
 Ocean. It was the middle of May, 1S3S. Our fortunes had been wrecke 
 in the financial crash of the year before, and like so many others, we st 
 out to find a new home and be>iin the world afresh . . . 
 
 Our journey from Philadelphia to Pittsburv;h toi>k abt>ut five days an 
 nights; an all-day ride by rail ti> Harrisburg, two days and a half on th 
 canal-boat to HoUidaysburg, a day in crossing the mountain on cat 
 drawn up inclined planes bv statii>nary entwines, and then let down on th 
 other side to Johnstown, and thence by canal-boar a^ain to the site c 
 old Fort Duquesne, at the junction of the Alleghany and Monongahel 
 Rivers. Here a steambi>at received us. and we floated down the beaurifi 
 river which Johi^ Randolph used to describe as "frozen t)ne-half of th 
 year, and dry the other half." At Cincinnati, we were reminded of th 
 perils o{ western navij^atit^n, for only a day or two before, a handsom 
 new steamer had been blown to pieces in front oi the town, and nearl 
 all on board perished miserably, drowned or scaldc\l, to gratify the whir 
 of the captain, who wished to display the speed of his boat, and, therefi^rc 
 ordered the safety-valves o( the boilers to be closed. A week's \'oyag 
 brought us to St. Louis, which prided itself upon a population of severs 
 thousand souls, but whose houses extended scarcely a quarter o{ a mil 
 back from the river front. In walking the streets one's ear could hardl 
 determine whether the town were French or English, for one languag 
 seemed to be spoken as much as the other, by blacks as well as whites 
 while an. additional interest was lent to the place by files of blankete< 
 Indians stalking about silent as ghosts. St. Louis was then the head 
 quarters of the American fur trade, and the peltries freighted in Mackina\ 
 boats as well as steamers, were brought to its le\ee from the head-water 
 both on the Missouri and Mississippi, and the voyaguers added anothe 
 charm to the picturesque groups of the thoroughfares. 
 
 Another night and part of the day were passed on a steamer in thi 
 "Illinois River trade," and we reached Naples in time for the mornini 
 stage for Jacksonville, a drive of twenty-five miles across the river bottom 
 up the bluff, through groves and prairies. It was out first experience o 
 prairie-land, and although more than fifty years have passed! since th( 
 drive on that summer morning, the impressions then created by the 
 landscape of that new world are still fresh and vivid in my memory . . 
 
 (5)
 
 Towards the end of our journey we drove up a long, gentle slope to 
 the top of the "mound," whence there was a wide view of surpassing 
 beauty. Houses and farms had begun to appear; and off to the southeast 
 a pasture of a thousand acres was pointed out in which countless cattle 
 were feeding. They as well as the great estate of which their meadow was 
 scarcely a tenth, belonged to Jacob Strawn, the great grazier and drover 
 who supplied St. Louis with beef-cattle, and was a representative man of 
 the time, scouring the country far and near to collect his herds, and then 
 driving them a hundred miles to market. It was said that he took but four 
 hours' sleep, and often a part of that was in the saddle. He had begun 
 life with nothing but his keen eye, quick wit, uncommon knowledge of his 
 business, and tireless energy, and by middle age had become one of the 
 greatest land-holders of the country, while few men were so widely known 
 as he, and none were more respected in business. Of no man could it be 
 more truly said than of him, that "his word was as good as his bond." 
 I suppose he was the pioneer and founder of the great cattle trade of the West. 
 
 From the "mound" our road lay along a ridge after a while skirted 
 on both sides by groves. A turn in the road brought us to College Hill 
 and Jacksonville — the goal of our two weeks' wandering was before us; 
 the new buildings of the college on our right and the house of Gov. 
 Joseph Duncan — probably the largest and handsomest in the State at 
 that day — on our left. The distance between Philadelphia and Jackson- 
 ville, which then took a fortnight to accomplish, can now be gone over 
 in a little more than thirty hours. 
 
 The town was planted in the middle of a beautiful but not extensive 
 prairie, the skirts of which were fringed with fine bits of timber, and along 
 one edge of it there wound from southeast to northwest a sluggish creek, 
 the Mauvaise Terre — called by the people the Mo\istar — which, after 
 following its crooked way many miles, empties into the Illinois River. It 
 received its name from the early French explorers, who thereby showed 
 themselves poor judges of good land, for there is not on earth a richer 
 and more fertile tract than that drained by the Mauvaise Terre. 
 
 An old geography described Schenectady, N. Y., as "a town of three 
 hundred houses and fifteen hundred inhabitants, all standing with their 
 gable-ends to the streets." Except for the gable-ends, the account might 
 stand for Jacksonville when we entered it. There were a few brick buildings, 
 store-houses, and dwellings, many more slight frame structures, but most 
 were the primitive log-cabins, some of which were covered by clapboards, 
 and not a few showing the solid stuff of which they were built. The "public 
 square" was the center of the town, in which stood the brick court-house, 
 and separated from it by a roadway, a two-storied market-house, the upper 
 floor of which was given to the lawyer's offices and a newspaper press, 
 
 [6]
 
 while from its gallery the politicians were accustomed to harangue thei 
 fellow-citizens gathered in the open space below. From that rostrum, oi 
 more properly speaking, forum for in old Rome the ft>rum was th 
 market-place, where causes were tried and oratii>ns, political as well a 
 forensic, delivered; and so the founders of the western town followo 
 strictly the classic precedent in using their market-hi>use for oratory a 
 well as the sale i>t meats and vegctahles; from that forum. I i>ften hean 
 speeches from many of the most distinguishc*d men of the West, whei 
 fledging their wings for a flight to Washington and natJDnal renown, on 
 of whom, Abraham Lincoln, IukI gained the perci^ of immortal fame. 
 
 The sides of the square were filled with business houses, dwellings an* 
 offices, and from the center of each line started the four principal street 
 of the town running to the cardinal points of the compass, and named 
 respectively. Spruigfield, St. Louis, Naples, and lk*ardstown the place 
 to which they led; while two smaller streets started from each corner o 
 the scjuare . . . 
 
 The population of Jacksonville and i>f the country tributary to it, al 
 o( which had come within less than twenty years, was drawn trt)m almi>s 
 every State of the Union, and from several countries in the Old World 
 England, Scotland, Ireland, and Germany. The two largest classes wer 
 from Connecticut, Massachusetts, and the mher New England State* 
 and from Virginia and North Carolina, by way of Kentucky, Tennessee 
 and Ohio; and the line which separated the "Yankees" and "Southerners 
 was broad and distinctly marked. Little lo\e was lost between them; ant 
 if there was not positive hatred, contempt, and scorn thinly veiled, wer 
 decided in each toward the i>ther. A "picayune Yankee," "no accoun 
 trash," "mighty small potatoes, and few in a hill," "people that wouh 
 skin a flea for his hide and tallow," were common terms o( reproach 
 hurled at the sons of the Pilgrims from those who boasted descent frou 
 the "Cavaliers;" and the compliment was returned by "lazy," "trifling,' 
 "people that hadn't no schoolin'," "unfacilized creerurs, that had mon 
 pride than brains or money, and that set no store by edicarion and virtoo.' 
 
 The thrift displayed by the people from the "Land of Steady Habits,' 
 in close trading, sharp bargains, and an eci>ni>nucal style o( living, wa 
 held to be meanness by the less prudent Kentuckian, while his freehanded 
 ways in business and housekeeping were considered by the other, "extrav 
 agance that tempted Providence." Many of the Southerners would swear 
 drink, and fight in the open day; the others rarely fought, drank only oi 
 the sly, and swore by periphrasis. The sins of the first were outbreak ini 
 and regardless of public opinion; those of the others were qualified b^ 
 "\ihat folks would say." The western man of southern descent boastev 
 
 (71
 
 that he didn't care "shucks" what people thought of him, and if "they 
 said anything he didn't like, he'd make 'em swallow it, or die tryin';" ''i{ 
 he wanted to chop wood on a Sunday, or ride his filly in a quarter-race 
 for money on Saturday, he reckoned it was his lookout, and nobody 
 else's." He kept one or more dogs to hunt coons and 'possums by night 
 with his boys and a party of friends. He was a dead shot with a rifle, and 
 claimed that he could pick out a squirrel's eye at a hundred yards. He 
 liked sport and holidays, and when mellow with corn whiskey, delighted 
 in a rough-and-tumble fight. Notwithstanding his show of free and easy 
 ways, the chances were that he was as keen in a trade, shrewd in a swap 
 or bargain as any other man, "for he had cut his eye-teeth in old Kaintuck 
 and allowed that the man who beat him in business would have to get 
 up a good while before day-light." He called all his neighbors and acquaint- 
 ances, even the most eminent citizens, behind their back or to their faces, 
 by the diminutive of their first names, as boys do — Joe, Jack, Billy, and the 
 like — and his talk was apt to be highly spiced with idioms, slang, and 
 not seldom with oaths. He was careless in dress as in speech; his laugh 
 as well as his talk was loud, and you could often hear his guffaw at a good 
 story a quarter of a mile away. Notwithstanding he would get as "mad as 
 hops," and thunder out his gibes in a torrent, his prevailing tone was 
 that of good humor. 
 
 Good neighborship was a prime article of his religion; if he had any- 
 thing particularly toothsome for dinner he never enjoyed it to the full 
 unless it was shared with guests, and until his wife had sent a part of the 
 luxury to the houses of one or more friends. In the sickness or trouble of 
 his neighbors, no man could be more sweet in sympathy and unwearied 
 in helpful attentions. If he became converted and renounced the world, 
 he joined the Methodist, Baptist, or "Christian" church, or if of the 
 Scotch-Irish stock, the old school Presbyterian. Before joining the church 
 he had read few books, but after that act he became a devout student of 
 the Bible, and of such literature as would help him to understand it better. 
 Apart from its molding power over the spiritual life and experience as 
 well as the moral conduct and standards of these early settlers, the influence 
 of the Sacred Volume in educating their intellect and faculties of expres- 
 sion has been incalculable. Without the heat and light which flow from 
 it as from the sun, and the life which they communicate, the men ot' the 
 West, whether their blood had its fountain north or south of Mason and 
 Dixon's Line, would still be laggards in the race o( civilization. 
 
 The prejudice in the mind and heart of the descendants of the South 
 towards the sons of New England had shown itself in their long and 
 bitter opposition to the first great work of internal improvement in Illinois 
 — the Illinois River and Lake Michigan Canal — because, they said, it would
 
 flood the country with Yankees, and to the name Yankee they prefixcc 
 not a few unsavory epithets. Unfortunately, the best known type oi 
 New England, at that early dav. was the peddler of wtxxJen cUxks, tir 
 and other wares, whose wayon pulled up in front ot nearly every 1i>b 
 cabin throughout the West, while his "slick jaw" and "everlasting jabl-nrr* 
 "bamboozled" old and young, and in the end they found "they had pni 
 dear for their whistle." Moreover, the early ministers, teachers, and pi> 
 fessors going as missionaries to the West, were in the habit of writint 
 home to friends and the public print, dismal and heart-rending account: 
 of the Ix'iughtcd heathenism oi (he Mississippi Valley, and savagery of it: 
 inhabitants, from which nothing could redeem them but the money anc 
 the labors o( New England people. These dreadful pictures, of course 
 fi>und their way back to the NX'est, inflaming the ire and embittering tht 
 hostility of those who considered themselves caricatured and belied. Th< 
 reserved manners and cautious speech o( the people from a colder climi 
 were more than distasteful to the outspoken men whi>se bKnxi was hot . . 
 
 Another root of bitterness which separated them was the different 
 of their views about slavery. Notwithstanding most of the better sort o 
 people had quitted Kentucky and Virginia because of their dislike of "Th( 
 Institution," and the wish that their children shi>uld grow up in a fre< 
 State, while the plainer people wished to escape the ixlium of not ownin) 
 and working "niggers." and of being rated as "poor white trash" by both 
 masters and sla\es; nearly all men of southern birth held an "abolitionist* 
 to be the vilest of mankind, and had a shrewd suspicion that almost ever 
 man from New England was tained with insane and incendiary opinion: 
 on this burning question. The rancorous feelings which had been stirrer 
 to the depths by the agitation of 1823-24, as to whether the Constitutior 
 of Illinois should be changed so as to admit slavery, and the slende 
 majority of 1800 against it, had not yet died out; and the death of th< 
 Rev. Mr. Lovejoy by the hands of a mob at Alton, in 1837, had thrown fue 
 on the smouldering embers and caused the flame of excitement to glov 
 for many years. The terms Yankee and Abolitionist were considered t< 
 be interchangeable, and both were a stone of stumbling and rock of offens< 
 to the Southerners — not to say a "stench in their nostrils." . . . 
 
 I may as well set down here some of the new words and phrases whicl 
 I found to be the current coin of the country, and show into what quee 
 forms the Queen's English has been twisted on the frontier. Not lonj 
 after our arrival, a K>y of my own age invited me to share with him th« 
 freedom which kind-hearted Gov. Duncan had given to range thnnigl 
 his watermelon patch. On our way I asked if we should find many; h< 
 answered, "Thousands, lots and gobs and mortal slathers." Invited ti 
 dine, my host said as we came to the table, "Hi>lp yuself to whatsiMudevc: 
 
 19]
 
 ye like, for if you don't holp yuself, nobody'll holp ye to yer meals' vittels." 
 "He's a cavortin' on a hi^jh horse," was said of a man trying to put on 
 style. "I'll be consarned if she's not a tarnation fine gal," would be said 
 of a pretty young woman. "You needn't be tryin' to bullyrag and scourge 
 me unless you're spilin' for a fight; and if you are, I reckon you'll find me 
 an owdacious scrouger that'll jist bodiacerously split you right open down 
 the middle." "You onery low-down dog," answers the person thus chal- 
 lenged, "ye needn't try to get shet of me with all yer tom-fool brag; I'll 
 knock you into a cocked hat soon'r'n ye kin say Jack Robinson." 
 
 The hours of the day were told by the motions of the heavenly bodies — 
 so many hours before sun-up, and so many after sun-down; and after the 
 rising, it was one, two, three hours by sun, and so on until noon, which 
 was always called dinner-time; and after that, three, two, and one hours 
 by sun — and people were as accurate in numbering the hours as if they 
 had referred to watches and clocks, and were rarely at fault even in cloudy 
 or rainy weather. The time for beginning evening service, whether at 
 church or other gatherings, was early candle-lighting, or, as it was more 
 popularly called, "yearly candle-lightin'." An object thought to 
 be particularly fine or handsome, was called a "jewhoUoper;" anything 
 ingenious and new was "a sharp contraption," and whatever smacked 
 of fraud was a "hooken-snivvey." . . . "Scrumptious" signified very good. 
 "Rinctum-rhino" was hard cash, and so was "spondulics." ... "I never 
 cross a river till I get to it," and "I never swap jack-knives while swimming 
 a horse over a river," were two sayings of the famous backwoods preacher, 
 Peter Cartwright, which, adopted by Abraham Lincoln, have passed into 
 proverbs; and, by the way, many of Mr. Lincoln's best stories and idioms 
 were derived from the old preacher . . . 
 
 Account also must be taken of the lawyers, doctors, and other men 
 of education, as well as the ministers and teachers, who helped to spread 
 sweetness and light among the masses of the people. Nor must the influence 
 of politics be forgotten. Many men from all sections ranged themselves 
 under the banner of "Old Hickory," as General Jackson was called; and 
 an almost equal number from both north and south were as enthusiastic 
 for Henry Clay. These leaders stood as the representatives of the political 
 doctrines of their opposed parties, and while a majority of voters on both 
 sides knew little or nothing about the currency, the tariff, and other vital 
 questions, they were ready to work, vote, and fight for the champions in 
 whtim they believed. Their untur^^rcd minds were slow in grasping the 
 ethical and practical cjuestions at issue, but pinning tiieir faith to their 
 leaders, and espousing the cause known as ^X'hig or Democratic, not that 
 they knew or cared much for the principles involved, but because they 
 rendered a homage that bordered upon worship to the commanders in 
 
 ( 10 1
 
 the conflict, and thus throunh the heat of enthusiasm, the ice of ignorance 
 was melted and the soil of their ii^tellects was mellowed to receive anc 
 germinate the ideas of political truth. 
 
 "Feller-citisens," exclaimed a Western stump orator, "Whar was Hcnn 
 Clay when General Jackson was a fitin' the enemies of his country, anc 
 lickir^' the British out'n their Ku>fs at the battle t>f New Orleans, and f 
 kiverin' hisselt, and every teller under hun with evcrlasrin" glory; whar.l 
 say, was Henry Clay? Why, he was a playin' bluff with the crowned head; 
 of Europe, and bettin' his millions i>n his hand, and nary a pair it^ it;' 
 referring t«.> Mr. C lay's stay in Huri>pe as one o( our plenipotentiaries tc 
 negotiate the treaty of Ghent, which closed our last war with Greai 
 Britain. 
 
 0( course, the Demtxrats rcvei\cv.i tins with whi>ops and yells, until 
 they were out of breath. The Whig orator answered: "Fellcr-citiiens 
 supposin' Henry Clay did play cyards with the kings and queens ol 
 Europe! didn't he break their bank, and bring all their money home with 
 him, an' gev it to the poor, never a keepin' a cent o( it for hisself.' Wasn't 
 he sent over to beat'em at every game, an' he did it? What's whalen' a 
 few Britishers, a few sivigers and generals, alongside o( lx*arin' all tht 
 kings and queens? With such men as he had, such dead shots, General 
 Jackson couldn't a helped whippin' the British; but it totik a man ol 
 giantific intelleck to clean out the whole crowd o( crowned heads, anc 
 that's what Henry Clay did. Now, let anybcxly say which is the best mar 
 for President of these United States,— him that trounced the British 
 sodgers, and killed a few officers, or him that busted the whole royal 
 family." Then it was the turn for the Whigs to shout until they were 
 black in the face . . . 
 
 I have spoken of our market-house, or forum, where on almost every 
 Saturday, if the weather allowed, when the country people came to town 
 to trade, crowds were gathered to hear the orators, old ai^d young, dis 
 cuss the political topics of the time — local, state and federal. Among oui 
 own politicians and lawyers were Murray McConnel, our wheel-horse ol 
 the DemcKracy, his son-in-law, James A. McDougall, afterwards a Senator 
 in Congress from California, Josiah Lamborn Lane, like Prentiss of Mis- 
 sissippi, and only inferior to him in eloquence at the bar and on tht 
 stump, and like him prematurely cut off, and by the same cause. Now ai^J 
 then uncle Peter Cartwright would make a Democratic speech when h« 
 came to attend his quarterly meeting, and Bnnher Newton Cloud, a 
 popular ItKal preacher living on Apple Crc*ek, and often a member o( tht 
 Legislature, would also favor the crtiwd with Democratic dcKtrines. On 
 the cither side we had Col. Jt>hn J. Hardin, i>ne of the mt>st gallant gentle- 
 men, powerful stump-sj>eakers, admirable and noble men whose namea 
 
 [11 1
 
 have shed luster upon the early days of Illinois. His brilliant career was 
 cut short on the field of Buena Vista, in the Mexican war. 
 
 Abraham Lincoln used to call him "more than his father," and said 
 that his debt to him was greater than he owed to any other man. Young 
 VC'illiam Brown, afterwards known as "The Judge," and young Richard 
 Yates, just out of college and beginning the practice of law, tried their 
 'prentice hands from that gallery. Judge Brown left the law and politics, 
 and the eminence he would be sure to gain, to become a banker; but 
 Richard Yates, or "Our Dick" as he was affectionately styled, went to the 
 Legislature, to Congress, became War-governor of Illinois, United States 
 Senator, and achieved a popularity among the people of his State second 
 only to that of Mr. Lincoln himself. Had his self-restraint been equal to 
 his popular gifts, he would no doubt have filled the presidential chair. 
 From other towns, such as Springfield and Quincy, we had Stephen A. 
 Douglas, even then beginning to be called "The Little Giant," who only a 
 short time before had been teaching a country school in a log-cabin in 
 an obscure part of our county; James Shields, afterwards a General both 
 in the Mexican and our Civil wars, and a Senator in Congress, I think, 
 from three different States. John A. McClernand came to us from Shawnee- 
 town, made speeches in private as well as in public, married one of our 
 girls, filled a seat in Congress, and distinguished himself as a General in 
 the Civil war. 
 
 On the other side we used to hear the brilliant O. H. Browning from 
 Quincy, Lisle Smith from Chicago, probably the most finished and graceful 
 orator at the bar and on the hustings Illinois has ever had; Mr. Butterfield, 
 from the same city, a great lawyer and an equally great wit; Col. Edwin 
 [Edward] D. Baker, scarcely second to Lisle Smith as an orator, who was 
 elected from our district to Congress, in 1844, resigned his seat in 1846 to 
 become Colonel of a regiment in the Mexican war, entered Congress 
 again from another Illinois district, removed to California, and practiced 
 law, thence to Oregon, where he was elected to the Senate of the United 
 States, was later appointed Brigadier-General in the Civil war, and in 
 1862 [1861] was killed at the head of his brigade in the battle of Ball's 
 Bluff, Va. No man of all the throng delighted us more by his speeches 
 than "Old Abe," as Mr. Lincoln was even then familiarly styled. His 
 tall, gaunt, awkward form, clad in homely, careless dress, his clear, simple, 
 convincing logic, his inimitable stories brim-full of wit, humor and pathos, 
 clinching his argument, his unruffled good nature united to make him a 
 prime favorite with every "Sucker" audience, even in those early days. 
 
 Speaking of Mr. Butterfield, I must put down two or three stories. At 
 the beginning of the Mexican war he was twitted by a political adversary 
 with having opposed the last war with Great Britian, in 1812, and would 
 
 [12]
 
 no doubt, oppose the picsciil uai. lie aiiswcioi, "ilic cxpcticiite 1 ^atitcti 
 in 1812, and afterwards, leads me to welcome pestilence, famine, war, and 
 all the other inestimable blessintjs broui^ht us by the DemiKratic 
 administration." 
 
 In 1842, as counsel fi>r the Mi>rmon prophet, Joe Smith, aruuinu a 
 writ of habeas corfyus before the District Court o( the United States, at 
 Springfield, Illinois, he moved for the discharge of the Prophet fri>m 
 custtxly. S«.> great was the popular interest in the case, that Judge Nathaniel 
 Pt^pe, father of Gen John B. Pope, held court in one of the Legislative halls 
 of the capitol, and around him were grouped many of the most beautiful 
 girls of the State, while Joe Smith was attended by his twelve apostles, 
 and the courtrtx^m was crowded with the nu>st eminent lawyers and 
 citizens of the commonwealth. Mr. Butterfield. dressed with exemplary 
 neatness in the blue and buff o( the i>ld \X'hig parry, rising to speak, 
 paused, ran his eyes admiringly from the central figure oi the judge along 
 the rows of lovely women on each side of him and said: "May it please 
 the court, I apfxrar before you ti>day under circumstances no\el and 
 peculiar. I am to address the Tope' (bowing to the judge) surrounded by 
 angels (Ix^wing still lower to the ladies), in the presence of the holy 
 Apostles, in behalf of the Prophet of the Lord." 
 
 In 1848, General Shields returning from the Mexican war, where he 
 had been wounded several times, became a candidate for the United 
 States Senate, defeated the eminent Judge Sidney T. Breese. One of the 
 General's wmjnds had been caused by a musket-ball entering his righr 
 breast, passing through the lung, and comii^g out ot his back. The morning 
 after the election, one of the judges of the Supreme Court, expressing his 
 astonishment at the result, said: "It was the war, and that Mexican bullet 
 that did the business." "Yes," answered Mr. Butterfield dryly, "and what 
 an extraordinary, what a wonderful shot that was. The ball went clean 
 through Shields withmit hurting him, or e\en leaving a scar, and killed 
 Breese a thousand miles away." 
 
 The boys of my age took the liveliest interest in the political speakers 
 and their harangues. Each one had his hero, and shouted for him with 
 all his might some for Douglas, others for Lincoln and taking sides 
 enthusiastically upheld the cause of party and chieftains with arguments 
 and sometimes blows. When the unequaled excitement of the log-cabin 
 and hard-cider for the presidency in 1840, with its battle-cry o( Vl'illiam 
 Henry Harrison and John Tyler, swept over the country, all classes, save a 
 few of the staunchest Democrats, were carried into the Whig ranks. Never 
 have I known the enthusiasm of the boys raisc*d to such a pitch as ii^ that 
 campaign. You may be sure that when they enter heart ai\d soul into a 
 p>olitical contest, the cause they espouse will win. The picturesque features 
 
 (13)
 
 of that memorable struggle — the log-cabins adorned wtih coon-skins, 
 furnished with barrels of hard-cider and plenty of gourds with which to 
 drink it, set on long wagon-beds hauled by many yokes of oxen, sur- 
 rounded by shouting crowds on foot and on horseback chanting the cam- 
 paign songs, each chorus rounded up with "three times three" for "old 
 Tippecanoe and Tyler too," paraded through the streets of every village, 
 and from county to county, through the wide West — kindled a flame of 
 excitement which carried everybody, especially the boys, off their feet. A 
 passion for politics, such as inflamed the western boys fifty years ago, I 
 must believe to be as good for them as the rage for baseball and sculling 
 matches, perhaps a little better . . . 
 
 Our town — or burg, as it was commonly called — was rich not only 
 as the seat of a college for boys,* but of an academy of high grade for 
 girls, t presided over by the venerable John Adams, who had been for 
 many years head master of Phillips' Academy, Andover, Massachusetts, 
 and whose presence among us, both in the day school and Sunday school, 
 was an inestimable blessing, doing much to soften and sweeten the man- 
 ners, elevate and refine the character of the girls. The college (Illinois) 
 was founded and manned by a small body of New England men, chiefly 
 from Yale, who had come out a few years before as pioneers in the cause 
 of higher education. The body of the fifty or hundred students came from 
 Illinois, Missouri, some from States farther South, and a few from the 
 East; except boys from the town, most were sons of New England parents. 
 Not a few of them "worked their way" through college, as it was called, 
 i.e., taught school a part of the year and attended college the rest, worked 
 on farms, chopping wood and the like . . . 
 
 Hard as our lines were, we had plenty of fun, for the West in those 
 days was the land of humor, and the love of it. He was the best fellow 
 who cracked the most jokes, told the cleverest and aptest stories. Abraham 
 Lincoln drew the exhaustless fund of his anecdotes and pay sayings from 
 the soil of our life and the social atmosphere we breathed, and was our 
 representative man. We were a jolly Democracy, free-hearted, open- 
 handed, with no pride of birth, station or money. 
 
 We knew no restraint nor conventions of older societies, but stood 
 on a level where every one did that which seemed good in his own eyes, 
 spoke his mind in such English as he could command, and feared nobody, 
 from our most eminent citizens, Gov. Duncan, familiarly called 
 "Governor Joe," and Col. Hardin, called "Col. John J.," down to the 
 boys whose heads were covered with coon-skin caps, and their bodies 
 
 * Illinois College, founded in 1829. 
 
 t Illinois Female College, founded in 1846, now MacMurray College. 
 
 [14 1
 
 with blanket overcoats, the less of their trousers tucked in the tops of 
 their boots, while they waded abc^ut in the deep, black, prairie mud. 
 Almost every man worked with his hands, and was ni»t ashamed of it; and 
 almost every boy lent his mother a lift in the business t>f the house, and 
 his father at the shop, store, or in the field. They cut the wixxl,. drew 
 the water from the well ai^d carried it to the house, milkcvl the cows, fed 
 the hojis, took care of the horses and oxen, and learned to turn their 
 hands to anything. Nearly every one of them carried a pistol, dirk or 
 bowie-knife, owned a rifle or shi>t-sun, and used it as an exjHrrt on quail, 
 prairie-chicken, rabbit, and squirrel, sometimes brin^itit; down a deer or 
 wolf. Most men and bc^ys chewed tobacco, smoked corn<ob pif">es, and 
 the use of whiskey was by no means uncommon. I remember a rebuke 
 administered by a staid old New Enylander at church to st)me tobacco- 
 chewin^j K^ys who sat next to him and expcxtorated freely on the floor; 
 with a significant kxik, but without a word, he stopped and be^^an to roll 
 up his trousers as if prepared to wade throujjh a muddy slou^jh; the 
 chewing ceased. 
 
 In my bt>yhood I often visited Springfield, where one of my recrea- 
 tions was to "loaf in front of the store of my old friend, Mr. James Lamb, 
 at the southeast corner of the public sc^uare, about one o'clock, when 
 people were on their way from dinner, and where Mr. Lincoln was almost 
 sure to stop, and a crowd soon gathered to hear his stories. He would 
 tell one or two, and this would call out one and another of his friends, 
 and that never failed to remind him of a fresh one, and thus the fun went 
 on sometimes for hours indeed, until time to go to supper — while all 
 the unemployed men and boys in that part of the town, often amounting 
 to hundreds, were gathered to listen to the yarns; and the shouts of laughter 
 called out by "Old Abe's" sallies o( humor and grotesque descriptic^ns, 
 could be heard half a mile away. In the hot summer afternoons he would 
 take off hat, coat, and waistcoat, and in shirt-sleeves become not only a 
 story-teller but an actor representing the scene and parties he portrayed. 
 The land has never had such a raconteur to suit the taste and humor of a 
 western crowd as he; and the discipline he thus acquired did not a little 
 toward giving him that almost unequaled style of speech in the court- 
 room, on the stump, and with the pen, — a style sure to go to posterity, 
 and live when most of the elaborate and stately declamations of the 
 Senate, rostrum, and bar, are forgotten. "One touch of nature makes 
 the whole world kin." 
 
 The Rev. John Milton (Mason) Peck, a Baptist minister from New 
 England, entered Illinois as a missionary about 1817. while it was a 
 territory, sewn made a home for himself, which he called Rixk Spring, 
 aJ^..iir rhirfv mill-, ••isf . .f 9f Louis, and by virtue of his devotion, energy, 
 
 (151
 
 and talents, became, and for many years continued to be, one of the most 
 influential and honored citizens of the country, doing more than almost 
 any other man of his generation to advance the highest welfare of the 
 people, and to bring into the land the best kind of settlers. He wrote not 
 a few books, and was, I suppose, the first literary man of the common- 
 wealth. In 1834, he published a Gazetteer of the State, which was issued 
 from the printing office in Jacksonville; and in the summer of that year, 
 made a journey with his own horses and wagon, and an equipment for 
 camping out, from his home at Rock Springs, to Chicago, about three 
 hundred miles . . . 
 
 When he reached Chicago, he saw Fort Dearborn surrounded by a 
 huddle of log-cabins, with here and there a house of brick, containing a 
 few hundred inhabitants, whose chief business was trading with the 
 Indians and waiting for the future. His page glows with the fervor of 
 prophecy while he tells the governor that during that year as many as 
 two hundred sloops and schooners and two steamboats, had entered the 
 mouth of the river, and adds, "Your excellency may think me crazy, but 
 I venture to predict that by the year 1900, or soon after, a railroad will 
 connect Chicago with St. Louis, and, perhaps, even places more remote." 
 No doubt all men outside of Chicago who read Mr. Peck's prediction, 
 even the governor, set Mr. Peck down for a dreamer; for Egypt, as southern 
 Illinois is called, had as little respect, in those days, for Chicago, and the 
 lands about it, as they now have for it. 
 
 My first visit to the "Garden City" was seven years after Mr. Peck's, 
 when it had grown to be a village of about five thousand inhabitants, as 
 unsightly as one could anywhere be seen on the muddy soil of the New 
 West. In addition to billious fever and the shaking ague, its inhabitants 
 had had already one or two attacks of the fever of land-speculation and 
 "wild-cat" money, which had left them barely alive, with only hope for 
 physic and to bank on. They were looking forward to the completion of 
 the canal which should unite the waters of Lake Michigan with those of 
 the Illinois River, and thus open a highway of commerce to St. Louis and 
 New Orleans. I once asked Thomas Carlyle the meaning of the word 
 "navvy" which he had used, but which was Greek to me. "Oh," he 
 exclaimed, "the navvy is the man who digs canals and is our modern 
 miracle worker. A company of your Methodist brethren, at Yeddon, in 
 Yorkshire, a dozen miles or more from the sea, was pouring forth their 
 supplications at a prayer-meeting, when one of them cried out, 'Oh Lord, 
 we beseech Thee to crown us with Thy mercy, and make Yeddon a sea- 
 port.' In due time the navvy came, a canal was dug, Yeddon became a 
 sea-port, and the miracle was wrought." And so, when I saw it first, 
 Chicago was on tip-toe, big with hope, waiting for the accomplishment of 
 the miracle at the hands of "Paddy, whose country was his wheelbarrow." 
 
 1161
 
 When I quitted the boggy, expectant village, it was in a good mail- 
 coach, drawn by a brisk team of four horses, with the accompaniment of 
 the driver's cracking whip and resounding horn; but at the end <.>f twelve 
 miles, we were requested to alii;ht and bestow ourselves in a "prairie- 
 schooner," as the long bi^x-wagiui, covered with a cloth o( ttnv-linen, was 
 called, and in this we ji>gi:ed the rest o( the hundred miles to Peru, at the 
 head o( na\ igatit)n on the llliiu>is ri\er, u here ue exchanged our schooner 
 for a little stern-wheel steamer. 
 
 Between Mr. Peck's first visit to Chicago and my own, tiie Legislature 
 ot Illinois, sitting at the capital Vandalia which name, by the way, was 
 bestowed by three commissioners, one of whom had read in some old 
 book that the Vandals were the most enlightened race of savages with 
 whom history makes us acquainted, and persuaded the other members of 
 the board that it was, therefore, the appropriate name for the capital of 
 Illinois had in its sessions of 1835-36-37, authorized a stupendous system 
 ot internal improvement by which the settled parts of the State were to be 
 grid-ironed with railways so that almost every farmer was to have immediate 
 and easy access to the great markets of St. Louis and New Orleans. One 
 of the principal lines was to run from the southern end of the canal to 
 Cairo, thus opening the way by the Mississippi to New Orleans; while 
 from the end of the canal to the northwest, the line was to run to Galena, 
 and Dubuque, Iowa. Innumerable lines were to cross the State from east 
 to west. Taxation for these improvements, however, was not to be thought 
 of, for the people were not willing that a mill should be added to their 
 present rates. 
 
 The budding statesmen at Vandalia, among whom were Abraham 
 Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas, then on their first political legs, insisted 
 that the money to carry out these works, and also to finish the canal, 
 could be raised upon lands derived from the Federal government, and 
 borrowed upon the bonds of the State at the east, and in Europe. The old 
 saying, "millions for defense, but not a cent for tribute," seems to have 
 been translated into "millions upon bonds, but not a cent to be paid." 
 The only one of these schemes which reached fruition, except the canal, 
 was a railway from Meredosia, on the Illinois River, to Jacksonville, a 
 distance of little more than twenty miles, afterwards extended thirty-five 
 miles farther to Springfield, which had meanwhile become the capital of 
 the State; for nominal reign of the Vandals had ended. There were two 
 locomotives on this line carrying passengers and freight at the rate of 
 ten miles an hour, but one of them blew up, and the other landed in a 
 ditch. Transportation, however, continued a while longer by the help of 
 mules, but even this ceased; we returned to the dirt-roads after the bubble 
 burst, and the State found itself hopelessly in debt, with nothing to show 
 for it . . . 
 
 (17 1
 
 The earliest settlers of the West, coming from heavily-timbered dis- 
 tricts, made their homes in the groves, and set to work to fell the trees 
 and "clean the brush" to open their farms, while near at hand were the 
 endless prairies, waiting for the turning of the sod; so strong is the power 
 of habit and lessons learned in the past, so small the power of intelligence 
 and recognition of the needs of one's present surroundings. It takes time 
 and discipline for men to learn the use of their eyes, and the brains 
 behind them; most prefer to see through their ears, and yield themselves 
 slaves to the traditions of the past. 
 
 Not a few o{ these pioneers were "squatters," shiftless people, unhappy 
 except on the farthest verge of the frontier, who could not bear to see the 
 smoke from neighbors' chimneys, and "took up lands," as it was called, 
 in the hope of selling out their pre-emption right and then moving farther 
 west. When Col. Hardin went to Jacksonville, in 1832, he called upon a 
 squatter's widow, living in a miserable cabin on the eastern edge of the 
 village, to ask if she would be willing to sell her forty acres. "Sell" she 
 answered, as she knocked the ashes from her corn-cob pipe, "I reckon 1 
 will, if ye'U give a decent price. We used to live in ole Noth Calina, till 
 neighbors got thick; then we struck out for Tennessee, so we could be by 
 ourselves; but neighbors cum agin; then we moved to Western Kaintuk 
 and they followed us there. At last, we struck out for the Illinois, and 
 kept on till we thought we were out of reach of people, and squatted 
 right here; but now they've cum and stuck a chunck of a town right 
 down alongside of us, so I can hardly breathe. My ole man's dead, and 
 me and the boys want to get to a decent country, where there haint no 
 interlopers; and we'll be mighty glad to sell our 'forty'." The Colonel 
 bought the land, and the squatters wended their way toward the setting 
 sun . . . 
 
 My second visit to Chicago was in the summer of 1846, five years 
 after the first. The town had nearly doubled its population, and, notwith- 
 standing its low, swampy level was maintained, was beginning to take on 
 some of the aspects of a young, enterprising city. Log-cabins were sup- 
 planted by houses of brick and frame, some of the churches were of 
 brick, in which the music was led by melodeon and choir. Board side- 
 walks were laid in some places, and logs at the street crossings, on which 
 one might skillfully avoid the perilous mire, while strangers had better 
 accommodations at improving hotels. The number of steamers from Buffalo 
 and other ports on the lakes was multiplying, but for transit on land you 
 were still obliged to depend on the stage-coach and prairie-schooner, over 
 roads well-nigh impassable in winter and spring, for the canal was not 
 c^pcn for business until two years later, nor did a n-iilo o( railway enter 
 the citv until 1851 .. . 
 
 1181
 
 Let me turn again to the home of my boyhood— Jacksonville — which 
 may stand as a representative of towns in the great valley. In the fifr>'- 
 four years I have known it, the population has grown from fifteen hundred 
 to only about titteen ilunisand, a normal development. Forty years ago a 
 \ alued triend ot mine* with whom 1 was in ti>llege, a practicing physician 
 .i> he has beei\ ever since, started a smalt club of men and women for 
 the study oi Plato's writings. From that time to this the club has met 
 every Saturday nuirning, except fi>r two or three months each year in 
 the heat ot summer, and the leader of the club was pri>nounced by Mr. 
 hmerson "the greatest living Platonist i>n either side of the water." Out 
 i<t that assemblage of serious-mindc*d i>ersons ii^tent u|H>n things not seen 
 r handled except by the spiritual part of man, innumerable clubs have 
 isen in the ti»wn literary, conversational, scientific, artistic, a micro- 
 >copic, a natural history, a Shakesj^earian. an art. a Browniiig. a historical, 
 and 1 know not what other clubs besides a Sorosis, anu>ng the first, if 
 not the very first, established in the country. Almost everybtxly in the 
 town, old and youi^g. men and women, laying claim to educatioti and 
 liberal tastes, belongs to one or another, or several o( these associations. 
 I he ii^telkvtual and siKial force of the town has crystalized in an 
 Akadamie " where several hundred pet>ple gather once a month in a hall 
 built by the founder ot the Plato Club, to hear and discuss papers written 
 bv resident and associate members from all over the civilized world, on 
 'he deefX'st questions of philosophy and science, in a serious and enlight- 
 ..ned spirit that would do credit to the most advanced learned societies 
 of the planet. 
 
 To this town had naturally gravitated many of the benevolent insti- 
 tutions of State, the school for the blind, one of the hospitals for the 
 insane, besides a private retreat, a school for the deaf-mutes, the largest 
 md foremost up<.>n earth; and there are also a school of art, a conservatory 
 k4 music, as well as Illinois College for boys, and two colleges for girls. 
 The houses of the better class of people are tasteful and commixlious. 
 but not expensive or ostentatious, and almost every one surrounded by 
 well-kept grounds and gardens, while the principal streets are embraced 
 with avenues of trees that would do credit to New Haven. The best and 
 handsomest structures in the town are the churches, in which is con- 
 liicted as orderly, solemn, and uplifting a service of song, prayer, and 
 ^crmon, as can anywhere be tound. 
 
 A considerable body of Irishmen and their families have made homes 
 for themselves in and about the town, and constitute a Roman Catholic 
 parish of not far from three thousand souls; while a colony of Protestant 
 
 * Hiram K. Jones. 
 
 1191
 
 refugees from one of the Portuguese islands, simple, industrious, honest 
 people, settled there a number of years ago. The mass of these foreign- 
 born people are quiet, good citizens, and their children, undergoing the 
 drill of an almost perfect system of public schools, are gradually becoming 
 Americanized, informed and reformed by our national traditions, usages, 
 and hopes, taking as keen an interest in elections, and not a few of them 
 as anxious to promote the welfare of the country by filling offices, as 
 those who, through their forefathers, boast a longer stay on this continent. 
 Nor must I forget the colored people, enough of whom live there to 
 support several churches, and constitute a quiet, orderly part of the 
 community, while their children answer the summons of the school-bell, 
 and are treading the paths which lead to the heights of intelligence, self- 
 control, and self-respect. 
 
 A corresponding advance has been made throughout the country. 
 The shiftless farming of the early time has given way before the better 
 methods and the best machinery of the later time. Instead of the log- 
 cabins of the old days, with their wretched out-houses, you now see 
 commodious and even handsome dwellings, great barns, well-appointed 
 stables and cow-houses, large orchards, and all the signs of thrift and 
 comfort. 
 
 A few years ago, at an annual meeting of the "Society for Home 
 Studies," in Boston, a paper on Shakespeare was read by Miss Gicnor, 
 the secretary, which called forth great praise, and Dr. O. W. Holmes and 
 Mr. Longfellow, who were present, declared it to be — for freshness and 
 vividness of statement, excellence of illustration, force, and finish of 
 style— one of the most remarkable essays they had read. It was written 
 by the wife of a farmer living not far from Jacksonville, who excused 
 herself to the secretary for what she called her "poor article," by the 
 statement that she had, on the day of writing it, cooked the breakfast and 
 dinner for a large number of her husband's hands in the harvest-field, 
 scrubbed the floors of the dining-room and kitchen, and then set herself 
 to writing the piece . . . 
 
 Thus have I seen a poor western village, where books were few and 
 opportunities for culture scanty, grow into a seat of good letters, good 
 manners, and high principle; where old jealousies and asperities have 
 been softened or have vanished altogether; where the standards of educa- 
 tion, morality, and religion have grown steadily higher, the horizon of 
 life widened, and its values immeasurably increased by faith, reverence, 
 and charity. The changes which have taken place in the town and county 
 I knew so well in boyhood, have been going on at the same rate and with 
 the same results in thousands of towns throughout the great valley; and 
 who can doubt that they will continue and increase? 
 
 [20 1
 
 ILLINOIS HISTORICAL SURVFT
 
 "■'■''''•'' "'"^^^r^Ltfrnvnr
 
 UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS URBANA 
 
 917 73463MSe9J C001 
 
 JACKSONVILLE 12S YEARS AGO JACKSONVILLE 
 
 tiiiiiiiiiiiiiiMm 
 
 3 0112 025341030