Coles County IL Archives History - Books .....History Of Coles County 1879
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Book Title: History Of Coles County

HISTORY OF COLES COUNTY.

HISTORY is the camera through which we view the events of countries and people.
It records the noble deeds of the soldier and the statesman, and stands the
proud monument of a country's greatness. It is history, sacred though it be,
that tells us of the glory of Eden, and the purity and happiness of the first
pair in its Elysian fields, and likewise of their transgression and fall. And
through the sixty centuries that have passed since the world's dawn, it is
history that presents to us, whether in types, in hieroglyphics or in tradition,
all that we know of men and things past. The events which constitute the annals
of a country are matters of at least some local interest, and be that country
ever so "beautiless, barren and bleak," it contains something of sufficient
importance to be engraved upon the pages of history. How much more important,
then, that the fertile region of which we propose to treat in these pages should
become a matter of record, and form a part of the history of a great State and a
great country.

   A history of Coles County is a part of the history of America. Every portion
of a thing goes to make up and becomes a part of the whole. The population of
this county constitutes a part of the forty millions of American citizens who
people this country, and their absolute wealth and prosperity make a part of our
national wealth and material greatness. The intelligence of its people form a
part of our intelligence as a nation. The patriotism and self-sacrificing
devotion of its sons, the gallantry and prowess of its soldiers on a hundred
battlefields, are no mean part of the pride and glory of this great American
nation.

   The age of Coles County (as such) is two years less than half a century, but
the date of its settlement extends back nearly a decade beyond its organization
as a county. Within that time, the events that have transpired and the scenes
that have been enacted upon its soil, will be the subject-matter of these pages.
Taking it from the time of its occupancy by the Indians, we will endeavor to
trace its progress from that wilderness state to the present period of its
wealth and prosperity. Its growth has been rapid and wonderful beyond the
wildest dreams of the pioneers who first set foot within its borders.

   The present territory of the county was formerly a part of the State of
Virginia, and ceded by her to the United States in 1784. and was called the
Northwest Territory. Virginia was the home of the "Father of his Country," and
prides herself still on being the mother of the nation's best Presidents; so
Coles County comes of no ignoble ancestry. In 1778, Virginia organized what is
now Illinois into one county, which, some years later, received the name of St.
Clair, from the then Governor of the Northwest Territory. In 1809, Illinois was
organized into a separate Territory, and was composed at the time of two
counties-St. Clair and Randolph. After this, Madison was set off from St. Clair,
and Crawford was afterward set off from Madison. When Illinois was received into
the sisterhood of States, in 1818, there were but fifteen counties, of which
Crawford was one. This county was named for Hon. William H. Crawford, who was
reputed an honest man, and a safe custodian of public money; for under the
administration of Madison and Monroe he was Secretary of the Treasury, and also
a candidate for the Presidency in the Adams and Jackson campaign of 1824. During
the year 1819, Clark County was set off from Crawford. It then embraced a large
extent of territory running up the valley of the Wabash, and far beyond, even to
the Canada line, or British possessions. Clark County was named in honor of Gen.
George Rogers Clarke, a native of Virginia, and a pioneer warrior of
considerable celebrity. In 1770, more than a quarter of a century before the
organization of Illinois into a separate Territory, he organized an army in
Virginia, and marched it across the Alleghany Mountains to the Ohio River. A few
years later, the world rung with the mighty achievement of Napoleon crossing the
Alps with a great army, but to our mind, the deed no more than equaled that of
Clarke in crossing the Alleghanies and traversing a wilderness with his little
band of soldiers, beset and harassed by hostile savages. He had never seen a
steamboat nor heard of a railway-train, but he understood war and the
transportation of an army. He built rafts, and on them shipped his soldiers down
the Ohio to the spot where Shawneetown now stands, and then by forced marches
through swamps and marshes tilled with water, often knee-deep to his men, he
moved them across the country to Kaskaskia and captured that important post from
the British. But all this belongs to State history.


Additional Comments:
Extracted from:

THE HISTORY OF COLES COUNTY. ILLINOIS,

CONTAINING

A History of the County—its Cities, Towns, &c; a Directory of its Tax-Payers;
Portraits of Early Settlers and Prominent Men; General and Local Statistics; Map
of Coles County; History of Illinois, Illustrated; History of the Northwest,
Illustrated; Constitution of the United States, Miscellaneous Matters, &c, &c.

ILLUSTRATED

CHICAGO:
WM. LE BARON, JR., & CO., 186 DEARBORN STREET.
1879.


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