Morgan County IL Archives History .....An Incident In Early History Of Morgan County 1901
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Deb Haines http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00003.html#0000719 April 7, 2008, 9:16 pm

Source: Publication No. 6 of the Illinois State Historical Library
Transactions of the Illinois State Historical Society
For the Year, 1901
Published by Authority of the Board of Trustees of the State Historical Library
Springfield IL: Phillips Bros., State Printers, 1901.


An Incident in the Early History of Morgan County, Illinois.

By John Yaple.

When I was a small boy, about five years of age, I witnessed an event that 
made a deep impression on my childish mind; and although more than seventy 
years have passed since it occurred, it is still retained vividly in my memory.

A few months before that time my father, Jacob Yaple, and his brother, John 
Yaple, had moved into the northeastern part of Morgan county, and taken up 
land on the headwaters of Indian Creek, that runs through the southern part of 
what is now Cass county, and empties into the Illinois river. They made 
improvements on the land, and each family (of the two brothers) occupied a 
cabin not far apart (in the present limits of Cass county), one on each side 
of the little branch, in order that they might use water from the same spring.

We children of both families played together and had all things for our use or 
amusement in common. One day late in the fall, in the year of 1827, I think it 
was, while playing in the woods a few hundred yards from our cabins, we 
children were suddenly greatly frightened by seeing a lot of Indians coming 
through the woods and making straight for our homes. There was quite a number 
of them, men, women and children, with a few horses and some dogs. On one of 
their horses they had several wild turkeys they had killed that morning; and 
going to my father's cabin, after all hands drinking out of the spring, they 
proposed to my mother swapping the turkeys for her chickens. My mother, I 
remember, was not inclined to part with her much-prized fowls, on which she 
partly depended for the support of the family; but the Indians, seeing that no 
men were about, caught several of the chickens, and left in their stead an 
equal number of turkeys, and then proceeded on their way to the northward. 
These Indians were not on the war path, having their families along, and were 
very good humored and friendly. They were a party of Sacs who had left their 
tribe encamped on, or above, Peoria lake, and had gone down the Illinois river 
on a hunting excursion, and were now on their return, traveling along the edge 
of the prairies.

At the time they arrived at our place father and Uncle John were gone to a 
neighbors, eight miles away, to assist in a "house raising," as was customary 
in those days. The house to be raised was a log cabin, such as ours, to be 
raised by "notching down" the corners as it was built up. We had no near 
neighbors, and my aunt had gone, a little while before, on horseback out into 
the prairie to look for the cows, leaving her baby, a few months old, asleep 
in its cradle. And I remember that cradle well—it was made of the bark of a 
large walnut tree with split board ends and rockers.

We children were very much afraid of the Indians, and we ran to our house on 
seeing them, and huddled together in the corner under the bed. Mother went out 
and shut the cabin door to keep them from coming in, and we watched her with 
great anxiety from our hiding place, through the cracks between the logs. 
After the Indians left we felt greatly relieved at their departure and crawled 
out. We were running around, looking over the ground and watching to see if 
our unwelcome visitors might be coming back again, when a noise in the 
direction of Uncle's cabin attracted our attention that way. We had not seen 
my aunt get back, but just then I saw her come out of her cabin door, and 
screaming to my mother to come there, she fell to the ground as if shot. I ran 
into our house and told mother that Aunt Ellice had called her and then fell 
down dead. Mother rushed out and ran to her and caught hold of her, and seeing 
that she was not dead, went into her cabin for some spirits of camphor; and 
there she at once discovered the cause of aunt's distress. The cradle was 
empty, the Indians having stolen her child.

Of course nothing could be done until the return of the men folks, which could 
not be expected until about midnight; and neither mother or aunt knew just 
where they had gone, and if they had known, there was no one to send for them; 
and aunt was too much prostrated to go, and mother couldn't leave her. So they 
could do nothing but cry and wring their hands. On the arrival of father and 
uncle, late in the night, they were soon informed of what had occurred.

They were both resolute and fearless pioneers, and began right away to make 
arrangements to follow the Indians. Uncle John went for their two nearest 
neighbors, Daniel and Alex. Robertson, who saddled their horses, and getting 
their rifles and ammunition, came with him. The four men, mounted on good 
horses, and Aunt Ellice on another one, with an extra horse to carry bedding 
and provisions required for the expedition, started about daybreak, taking a 
due north course. There were then neither roads, ferries or bridges in this 
part of the State; and the sun was their guide by day to the direction they 
desired to follow. It soon began raining, and when they got to the Sangamon 
river the water was up, and they were delayed some little time in finding a 
suitable place for swimming their horses across. Though the Indians were all 
afoot, with two or three horses to carry their traps, they traveled fast, and 
the rain made their trail hard to follow. Father and his party pushed on all 
the day time, and camped wherever night overtook them, when they would build a 
big fire, and dry their clothes and cook supper; then be off again before day 
light next morning. The high water in the Mackinaw gave them considerable 
trouble; but they got across it too by swimming; and continuing the chase they 
finally came to the main camp of the Indians at the lower end of Peoria Lake. 
Going at once to the chief's lodge they soon told him, by aid of a half-breed 
who could speak English a little, what they had come for. The chief said he 
knew nothing about it, and did not know that the band that went down the river 
hunting had yet returned; and if they had returned he could not tell where 
they were, as the Indians of his tribe were scattered on both sides of the 
river from that point—at the foot the lake—to where Joliet now stands. He told 
them to hunt through the different camps, and if they could find the child to 
take it, and he sent an Indian with them for their protection. Then commenced 
the search in earnest. They crossed and recrossed the Illinois river several 
times, paddling over in canoes and leading the swimming horses behind them. 
The child was stolen from its cradle by a young squaw who had, while down the 
river, lost her babe, by death, of about the same age as this one. Seeing the 
white baby asleep in the cabin, with no one about the place, her motherly 
feelings overcame her and she carried the child off. It had replaced her dead 
babe in her affections, and she did not want to part with it; so, when she 
heard that its parents were in pursuit of it she hid it in a dark corner of 
one of the lodges. Father and Uncle John were very diligent in their search; 
and having the chief's authority, they looked into every place about the 
Indian camps where the child could possibly be secreted. At length their 
perseverance was rewarded. Looking in one of the lodges behind a stack of dry 
deer skins they found the lost child securely strapped to a board after the 
Indian method of cradling their children. The squaw-mother parted with the 
baby she had stolen very reluctantly, and wept piteously when its white mother 
took it away.

The captured child, while showing great need of a white woman's care, appeared 
rugged and healthy. As a boy he was always conspicuous for his erect figure; 
and we used to say that his straight back was the result of having been 
strapped to a board while in the hands of his Indian-mother. The party, having 
the additional care of the baby, and bad weather, had a rough trip back home; 
but arrived all well and very tired, much to they relief of my mother, who had 
remained in the cabin alone with the children of both families. The stolen 
babe mentioned is now, December 30, 1899, an old man, residing in Hancock 
county, in this State; and often tells of his infant experience—not from 
memory of course; but as narrated to him by his courageous parents.

Virginia, Cass Co., Illinois, December 30, 1899.

Written by Dr. J. P. Snyder from the account given by him orrally by Mr. John 
Yaple.


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