Anderson County KS Archives History - Books .....Chapter I 1877
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Book Title: THE HISTORY OF ANDERSON COUNTY, FROM ITS FIRST SETTLEMENT TO THE FOURTH OF JULY, 1876.

HISTORY OF
ANDERSON COUNTY, KANSAS.

CHAPTER I.

  History of the First Settlement by the Pottowatomie Indians, in 1837—Their
Removal, in 1854— First Settlement by Whites, in 1854.

  IN 1837 the United States removed the Pottowatomie Indians of Indiana to a
tract of country on the Osage river, sufficient in extent and in every way
adapted to their habits and necessities. When they arrived on the Osage, or
Marais des Cygne, river a reservation of ten miles square had been set off near
Osawatomie, as a missionary reserve for the various Indian tribes settled on the
Osage river. The early maps of Kansas Territory show the location of this
reservation. The Pottowatomie Indians had their principal village at what is now
known as Dutch Henry crossing of the Pottowatomie, a stream that waters the
entire northern portion of Anderson county, which received its name from the
Pottowatomie tribe, on their first arrival in the Territory.

  Soon after they were located here they began to extend their settlement south
and west, along the several tributaries of the Pottowatomie. In 1838 they made
some improvements on the present town-site of Greeley; and in the neighborhood
above they built some bark shanties, put some small pieces of land in
cultivation, and planted some peach trees. This was the first settlement of any
kind in the territorial limits of what now constitutes Anderson county.

  The Pottowatomies remained in this locality until the spring of 1854, when
they were removed to that portion of country known as Pottowatomie county, where
they owned a large tract of land. These Indians had numerous missionaries of the
Baptist and Methodist denominations stationed among them.

  When the first whites settled in Anderson county, in the spring of 1854, they
found some of the Indian cabins, and old fields that they had cultivated. Some
of their peach trees remained on the creek for several years afterward.

  In the early part of May, 1854, the first white settlements were commenced on
the Pottowatomie, in the neighborhood where the town of Greeley is now situated.
Valentine Gerth and Francis Myer were the first white settlers in the territory
now included in Anderson county. They came from Missouri, and settled on the
present townsite of Greeley, early in May, and planted a crop of corn, on an old
Indian field, and raised a fair crop therefrom. They were young men, without
families. Henry Harmon came with his family, and settled near the junction of
the Pottowatomies, north of the present town of Greeley. He came a few days
later than Gerth and Myer. Oliver P. Ran settled in the Sutton valley the same
spring. During the summer and fall following a few more settlers came and made
settlement in the same neighborhood, among whom were Henderson Rice, J. S.
Waitman, W. D. West, Thos. Totton, Anderson Cassel and Dr. Rufus Gilpatrick.

  In the winter of 1854 and 1855 a number of Germans from St. Louis, Mo., came
to the Territory and located on the South Pottowatomie, above Greeley—took
claims, and built several cabins of poles. These cabins extended as far up the
stream as the timber was desirable—they selected the most desirable timber
claims on the creek. They returned to St. Louis early in the spring of 1855,
but, on account of the troubles in the Territory, they never came back; and the
settlers who came in the spring and summer of 1855 moved into their cabins and
occupied their claims.

  In the spring of 1854, after the Indians had removed from the Pottowatomie,
the territory now embraced within the limits of Anderson county was entirely
uninhabited; not a human being resided within any portion of its territory; it
was one vast unoccupied space. Not a single road entered its territorial domain
to guide the lonely emigrant in search of a home, or to direct his weary
footsteps over the prairies, or to disclose to him the places to cross the
streams. The Indians, their missionaries, their traders, and the general loafers
around Indian camps, had all gone. Everything about their former abode was
dismal, and a gloomy solitude pervaded the former homes of the noble red men of
the forest.

  The prairie had put on its green vesture, the trees were just putting forth
their foliage, the beautiful landscapes were clothed in their habiliments of
green, the breezes were freighted with the fragrance of the numerous wild
flowers—all combined to make it a most desirable location; and when the emigrant
in search of a new home came in sight of these beautiful scenes, he exclaimed, I
have found the place where I will make my future home; here will I settle, erect
my dwelling house, make a farm, call my family around me—will help build: up a
prosperous country. We find everything in nature here to make being happy and
life desirable.

  J. G. Whittier, in his poem entitled "The Kansas Emigrants," has most
beautifully described the feelings and sentiments of the early emigrants:

THE KANSAS EMIGRANTS.

We cross the prairie as of old
  The pilgrims crossed the sea, 
To make the West, as they the East,
  The homestead of the free!

We go to rear a wall of men
  On Freedom's southern line. 
And plant beside the cotton tree
  The rugged Northern pine!

We're flowing from our native hills
  As our free rivers flow; 
The blessing of our mother-land
  Is on us as we go.

We go to plant her common schools
  On distant prairie swells. 
And give the Sabbaths of the wild 
  The music of her bells.

Upbearing, like the Ark of old.
  The Bible in our van, 
We go to test the truth of God
  Against the fraud of man.

No pause, nor rest, save where the streams
  That feed the Kansas run,
Save where our Pilgrim gonfalon 
  Shall flout the setting sun!

We'll tread the prairie as of old
  Our fathers sailed the sea, 
And make the West, as they the East.
  The homestead of the free!



Additional Comments:
THE HISTORY OF ANDERSON COUNTY,
FROM ITS FIRST SETTLEMENT TO THE FOURTH OF JULY, 1876.
BY
W. A. JOHNSON,
CHAIRMAN OF HISTORICAL COMMITTEE.

PUBLISHED BY KAUFFMAN & ILER, GARNETT PLAINDEALER,
1877.

Entered according to act of Congress, in the year 1877, by
KAUFFMAN & ILER, In the office of the Librarian of Congress,Washington, D. C.


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