Meeker County MN Archives Biographies.....Caswell, A. M. 1833 - 
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Joy Fisher http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00001.html#0000031 December 26, 2019, 10:40 am

Source: Alden, Ogle & Co.
Author: See Below

   PROMINENT among the old settlers is A. M. Caswell, who now resides in the village
of Litchfield. He was born in Melbourne, Canada, October 2, 1833. His father, Moody
Caswell. was born in Vermont, and his mother, Hannah (Bishop) Caswll. in New
Hampshire. They lived in Canada until he was past seventeen and then moved to
Vermont, and from there to New Hampshire, and came to Minnesota in April, 1856. They
came to Dunleath, Ill., by rail arid thence up the Mississippi on the old steamer
“War Eagle.” There were about 700 passengers on board, generally in high spirits
about the prospects in the Territory of Minnesota, where the land was rich and money
plenty. They landed at St. Paul and then took the stage to St. Anthony. There was
only a few houses there then and one sawmill; from there they came by steamboat up
the river to Monticello, where they stopped until about the 1st of June, and then,
hearing of the great chance for getting land on the big prairie in Meeker county,
and as there was a party of immigrants came along,  A.  M. Caswell followed, and
camped the first night alone in the woods about midway between Monticello and
Kingston. The next morning he came up with Patch’s company, and camped on the bank
of Crow river. The water was high, and as there was no bridge, they had to make a
raft of logs. After crossing the river the company scattered, hunting claims. Our
subject traveled to Forest City and took dinner with Thomas Skinner, a whole-souled
and public-spirited gentleman, always courteous and obliging to everybody, in whose
death Meeker lost one of her best men. From there he started with two others to look
for claims, and traveled over the level prairie of Harvey, but found it generally
marked, as a party had been through there and marked claims for all their relatives,
some which were yet in the old country, so he left that and went above the woods in
the vicinity of Manannah, and there the claims were vacant, and he marked his
claim—the first one marked in the township—and then returned to Monticello. He was
boarding at a hotel, when a party came, who had been through to the big prairie,
among the party being T. C. Jewett and Captain A. D. Pierce, an old sea captain from
Cape Cod, Mass., who said he had been up above Forrest City and located a town site.
He gave glowing accounts of the country and said there was only one claim marked
there and that was just the one he wanted to build his town on, and he was going to
have it. He also said that he camped on the highest hill there was near there,
(which must have been Tower Hill) and fought mosquitoes all night, and he foresaw
the great events of the near future; the network of railroads that would come to and
through his town. He took out his book and read the name that he found on his claim,
as he called it, and it happened to be Mr. Caswell's; he afterward tried to scare
Mr. C. off, but failing to do it, he bought him off by paying fifty dollars and a
watch. He afterward stated that the trade was like a horse-trade, and he was mighty
sick of the horse. Mr. Caswell then made another claim where F. F. Phillips now
lives, and his brother, Albert, came on and took one adjoining, and his father,
mother and sisters came the next fall. His mother was afflicted with a rose cancer,
and after having it cut out died within a year, being the first woman buried in
Manannah grave-yard.

   But the flush times of 1856 were followed by several years of dearth, or almost a
famine. There was no money in the country and scarcely any provisions, and for two
or three years a laboring man could get neither money, clothing nor provisions for
his work. The only way to get money was to hunt or trap for fur, which was
hard-earned money. So, getting tired out or starved out, at Manannah, his brother,
Albert, and himself, and Ziba and Nathan Caswell started out for the gold mines at
Pike's Peak, in Colorado, and were gone from the State most of the time until after
the Indian war. Our subject was at work in the mines in Colorado, and his brother
and Ziba Caswell were in Nevada in the Washoe silver mines. They heard of the Indian
war and started for home, and although they were two thousand miles apart when they
started and neither party knew when the other was going to start, they met in
Minneapolis and came home on the stage together.

  The next spring A. M. Caswell was married to Vesta J. Britt, of the town of
Harvey. They kept a hotel at Coon Creek one year, then sold out and went to Anoka,
where they remained about three years. They then sold out and moved to Harvey
township, where they lived until removing to Litchfield in 1888. Mr. and Mrs.
Caswell have two children — one a young man, twenty-four years old, and a daughter
about eight.

  In speaking of the “old times” Mr. Caswell says: “When I came to this county,
there had never been a bushel of wheat, corn or potatoes raised here. Now nearly
every acre of prairie and thousands of acres of brush and timber land are under
cultivation, and thousands of reaping and threshing machines are kept busy, instead
of the old down reaper that took four horses, two men and a boy to operate, the
grain having to be raked off by hand, and much of it left scattered on the ground.
We have a machine that three horses and one man manage easily and which leaves the
grain tied up in neat bundles, leaving the field clean as if it had been gleaned by
the gleaners of old times. But the young men that were vigorous and strong and
active are now becoming old, bleached and gray; but there is another generation
coming on to fill our places. I have faith and believe there is a bright future for
Meeker county, and that it is bound to be one of the richest and best
stock-producing counties in the Northwest.”


Additional Comments:
Extracted from
Illustrated Album of Biography
Meeker and McLeod Counties, Minnesota
1888


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