Dakota Territory History - 1880-1881 This information appears in Chapter LIII of "History of South Dakota" by Doane Robinson, Vol. I (1904), pages 306-309 and was scanned, OCRed and edited by Joy Fisher, http://www.rootsweb.com/~archreg/vols/00001.html#0000031 This file may be freely copied by individuals and non-profit organizations for their private use. Any other use, including publication, storage in a retrieval system, or transmission by electronic, mechanical, or other means requires the written approval of the file's author. This file is part of the SDGENWEB Archives. If you arrived here inside a frame or from a link from somewhere else, our front door is at http://www.usgwarchives.net/sd/sdfiles.htm CHAPTER LIII THE HARD WINTER OF 1880-81. The great blizzard of the middle of October, 1880, was the initial performance of a winter unprecedented, and never succeeded in severity, in the history of Dakota or the northwest. Heavy snows and severe storms came at frequent intervals, rendering train service unreliable and uncertain, hindering the removal of crops and the shipment into the country of supplies of fuel and groceries. Early in January on many lines train service became utterly impracticable. It was before the invention of the rotary snow plow, and the constantly accumulating masses of snow blown back and forth by violent winds filled the cuts to a vast depth. More than eleven feet of snow fell during the season and all of it remained in the country, there being no thawing weather. Hundreds of snow-shovelers were employed by the railways leading to Dakota. They would attack a drifted cut, and shovel the snow out and into great banks upon either side. The winds of that night would possibly fill the enlarged cut to the brim, and another day's work would simply result in raising the banks higher, making place for deeper drifts. In this way mountains of snow were built up over the tracks in the very places where the greatest effort was made to open them. Even in the open places it was no uncommon thing to find the telegraph wires buried under the snow. On the 2d of February, when it appeared that nature had exhausted all of her resources in supplying material for drifts, a snow storm set in which continued without cessation for nine days. In the towns the streets were filled with solid drifts to the tops of the buildings and tunneling was resorted to to secure passage about town. Farmers found their homes and their barns completely covered and were compelled to tunnel down to reach and feed their stock. Among the homesteaders, "straw barns" were very popular, affording a cheap and comfortable protection for stock and these became hidden under the general level of the snow on the prairies and a favorite method of reaching stock stabled in this way was through a well sunk directly down from above, through which provender was carried in. The supply of fuel and necessities for living were soon exhausted. There were few mills in the country and flour soon was not obtainable, but there was wheat in abundance and it was ground into a sort of graham in coffee mills. The farmers burned hay and in the towns the lumber from the yards, small buildings, bridges, fences, particularly the snow fences along the railways, were burned. One of the great inconveniences was the lack of oil for lighting. The country was new and the production of lard and tallow only as yet nominal. The kerosene at the stores lasted but a few days after the trains stopped, and many families were compelled for several months to sit in darkness. In every town the business men organized themselves into relief committees to see that there was an equitable distribution of such supplies as could be secured, and they extended their relief work over all of the adjacent territory so that all were supplied, and, while there was great hardship, there was very little real suffering. Several families would colonize in one habitation to save fuel. The people were as a rule young and healthy, and it is the almost universal testimony of the pioneers that they have never gotten more real enjoyment out of a winter than they did from the winter of the big blockade. Shortly after the big snow of February, a thaw came of sufficient power to soften the surface of the drifts and an immediate freeze followed forming an impenetrable crust and thereafter sleighing was superb. This condition continued until the 26th of April. Up to this time it seemed as if the spring sun made no impression whatever, but upon the day mentioned the break came and in twenty-four hours the snow was resolved into water and the prairies became one vast lake. As it drained away the streams became torrents, sweeping everything before them. Fortunately in the new settlements there were few valuable improvements along the streams to be lost, but in Sioux Falls the loss was great, aggregating about one hundred and thirty-five thousand dollars. Previous to this, however, a great disaster from floods had befallen the Missouri valley, wreaking its greatest damage upon Yankton and Vermilion. While the drifts and the ice remained unbroken by the spring sunshine in the Dakota region the breakup occurred at the usual season in the upper country, thus precipitating upon the lower region a winter flood. About the 20th of March the high water, bearing the broken ice from the upper river, reached the vicinity of Yankton, but it was not until the evening of March 26th that it had affected the deeply frozen ice bridge at Yankton, which then gave way with scarcely a moment's warning. At once the water rose with incredible rapidity and in a few moments the banks were full. The vast stream of grinding ice continued to sweep by upon a constantly raising tide until the evening of March 29th, when the ice gorged at Hagin's bend, a dozen miles below Yankton, and the pack was held back as far as Springfield. It remained stationary until after eleven o'clock next morning, when the river of ice, rods in height, seemed to tower over the levee. At that time a shiver agitated the vast mass and with a mighty roar it moved down the stream. At the same time the water began to rise. Faster and faster it came until it could be seen to creep up the banks, Fifteen steamboats were on the ways at Yankton. Great cakes of ice went hurtling against them, crushing holes in their sides, snapping immense hawsers and tossing the "Black Hills," the "Helena" and the "Butte" into a common jumble. The water poured over the railroad track and hurled the "Livingstone" clear across that barrier and carried the "Nellie Peck" and "Penina" far inland. Finally it broke all bounds and poured into the city. All of lower Yankton was instantly flooded, and the flourishing village of Green Island, just across the narrow channel from Yankton, on the Nebraska side, was utterly destroyed, and for the past twenty- two years the main channel of the Missouri has swept over the spot where Green Island formerly prospered. To persons even who are familiar with the awful power of the mighty river in ordinary seasons, the irresistible majesty of its action on this occasion is beyond comprehension. After the rise above described the river rapidly subsided and on Thursday, the 31st, Friday and Saturday. it remained within its banks and the residents regarded the trouble as over and many began to move back into their deserted and flood-swept homes. On Sunday morning another gorge formed at the bend and immediately the imprisoned ice filled the stream from bank to bank and piled up in places to a height of ninety feet. The gorge held firmly until the evening of Tuesday, April 5th, when it again broke and, as before, was followed by the flood which this time reached the great height of forty-one feet above low water. From Yankton the entire bottom eastward to Vermilion and below was a scene of awful desolation. The citizens of Yankton, under the lead of Captain A. W. Lavender, an experienced sea-captain, organized boating parties and invaded the ice-packed ocean, rescued the inundated people and fortunately not a single life was lost. At Meckling the settlers gathered in a grain elevator and were imprisoned there for several days. But while the suffering and the loss at Yankton were so aggravated, it was at Vermilion that the great weight of the disaster fell. The original town was built below the hill, a few hundred feet below where the Milwaukee depot now stands. At about midnight on Sunday evening, March 27th, the ice broke up at Vermilion, but almost immediately gorged at the bend five miles below town. The rapidly accumulating water began almost instantly to pour through the streets and a fire alarm was turned in to arouse the people, and every one escaped to the highland with such effects as they could gather up. The water then subsided somewhat and no further fear was felt until Thursday morning, the 31st, when it again rose rapidly and by nine o'clock the buildings began to float away. That day and night forty buildings floated off. At this time a fierce blizzard was blowing, making it almost impossible to handle the boats in rescuing property. For two weeks the town site was flooded. The Standard's account of the visitation concludes : "Vermilion and the farmers on the bottom lands in Clay county were probably the worst sufferers in Dakota. The tract of country lying between Vermilion and Gayville was swept clean of everything. Houses, barns, fences, cattle, horses, hogs and sheep were destroyed, leaving the farmers and their families little else than the clothing upon their backs and their bare lands without teams, farming implements or a grain of seed to commence farming operations with. Three-fourths of the town of Vermilion was destroyed. One hundred thirty-two buildings were totally destroyed and many others wrecked. The total value of the property destroyed was about one hundred and forty thousand dollars." Fortunately no lives were lost. It would seem that the terrible winter and the great disasters following would have had the effect of suspending immigration to Dakota, but no such result followed. Everywhere the prospective settlers were gathered, awaiting the raising of the blockade that they might flock in and, except in the flooded section along the Missouri, the territory was blessed with an abundant harvest. The railroads continued the work of gridiron-mg Dakota. The Milwaukee completed its line from Webster to Aberdeen, reaching the latter town on July 5th. Its Southern Minnesota line was extended west as far as Howard. The James valley line of this road was built south from Aberdeen. to Ashton. The Northwestern was finished from Huron to Ordway, and work was begun on the Sioux Valley line north from Brookings. On September 8th of this year the first artesian flow was struck in Dakota, at Yankton. The subject had been long under discussion but to Isaac Piles belongs the credit of having been first to take active steps to bring the matter about. After spending a Sunday afternoon at the home of Judge Samuel A. Boyles, in company with judge Ellison G. Smith, now of the first circuit, the artesian well proposition having been talked over in a speculative way, Mr. Piles returned to his home and that night resolved to undertake to interest enough of the business men of Yankton in the matter to make an experimental trial. He went in the morning to Gen. W. P. Dewey, who wrote a stock subscription paper for the proposed organization of the Yankton Artesian Well and Mining Company, fixing the shares at five hundred dollars each, and Mr. Piles started out with it. Judge E. T. White became interested at once and with Mr. Piles they obtained about eight thousand dollars in stock subscriptions. The company was organized, a contract entered into on January 4, 1881, with Mars & Miller, of Chicago, to sink a well to the depth of one thousand five hundred feet if necessary, for which they were to receive four dollars per foot. The success of this enterprise induced the Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway to undertake a well at Aberdeen and a good flow was secured at nine hundred and eighty feet, being the second of the thousands of wells which now spout all over South Dakota. The legislature convened early in January and organized with George H. Walsh, of North Dakota, and E. B. Dawson, of Vermilion, as president and clerk of the council, and J. A. Harding. of Deadwood, and Frank J, Mead, of Bismarck, speaker and clerk of the house. It was an uneventful session. The penitentiary was located at Sioux Falls and fifty thousand dollars of bonds issued for its construction, being the first Dakota bonds offered for sale. Aurora county was organized August 8th and Day county on December 5th. At a meeting of the Association of Congregational churches of Dakota held at Canton in June, it was resolved to establish a college at Yankton. This action was the result of the strong advocacy of Dr. Joseph Ward, of Yankton, who tell years before had founded Yankton Academy, which subsequently became the foundation of the splendid city school system of Yankton. The college was duly established in conformity with this resolution and opened for classes in September of that year. Gall and Sitting Bull, it will be recalled, fled to Canada, and had continued to hang along the border, tantalizing the soldiers of General Miles, who were constantly on the watch for them. In the spring of 1881 Gall returned to the American side and after a sharp encounter with the troops on Poplar river he surrendered and was taken to Standing Rock agency, where he was paroled and returned to the home where he was born, on Oak, or Rampart creek, where he remained until his death, a friendly Indian. Sitting Bull, learning of the surrender of Gall, appeared at Fort Buford and surrendered. He was taken prisoner to Fort Randall, where he was kept under surveillance until the summer of 1883, when he was returned to his people at Standing Rock, making his home on Grand river, South Dakota.