Dane County WI Archives History - Books .....Chapter I In The Beginning 1877
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Book Title: Madison And Dane County And Surrounding Towns...

HISTORY OF MADISON.
CHAPTER I
IN THE BEGINNING.

  Soon after Pere Marquette made his way to the Mississippi, from the Lakes,
this Western country was overrun by Canadian French voyageurs, whose country,
language and religion, were considerable aids to trade among the tribes of
Indians, recently gathered into the fold of the Catholic church. There is no
positive evidence that they were on this identical spot, but a probability, all
but overwhelming, suggests their presence in the Lake country, because the
Indians were here, and, moreover, because the conformation of the country, the
large and beautiful lakes, and other well known features, specially adapted this
particular locality for the supply of peltry. There was a mission house at or
near Green Bay before Marquette's world-famous canoe voyage by the Fox and
Wisconsin rivers; but there is no mention by which our topography is identified
until more than a century later, in the records of Capt. Carver, as published
after 1768. His "Travels through the interior parts of North America" make
unmistakable references to the Blue Mounds, which he knew, probably from the
Indians, were supposed to be rich in lead. The captain shrewdly suspected the
trappers of having purposely misrepresented the territory for their better
security as. to ulterior designs of their own. The Jesuit maps of the Lake
Superior country, prepared a century earlier in Paris, were very good,
considering the limited facilities of the priests by whom the information was
supplied, but the operations of the Canadian voyageurs, jealously defending
their trading privileges, after their old home had passed under the rule of
strangers, would be subject to very different rules.

  The Sacs and Foxes held this territory from time immemorial, so far as we have
any positive knowledge, until the year 1825, when the Nations sold their rights
to all lands east of the Mississippi. Unfortunately, for the red men, they were
persuaded by some of their leaders to play fast and loose with their treaty, and
after the first removal, there were almost continuous returns, and on many
occasions marauding parties inflicted damage on property and life by way of
asserting a right to their old hunting grounds. In the year 1831 things had
become unendurable, and it was found necessary to drive the Indians back across
the newly agreed upon barrier, the Mississippi. The Winnebago outbreak and the
Black Hawk war, the first named in 1831-2, and the latter concurrent with or
immediately following, were parts of the same scheme of aggression, intended to
recover for the tribes the lands already sold and delivered by their chiefs and
themselves. Eventually the Indians were repressed and forced back with a firm hand.

  The first attempt at settlement in this county was made in 1827-8, by Col.
Ebenezer Brigham, who died in this city at the advanced age of seventy-two, in
the year 1861. He visited "Wisconsin in 1822, but it was not until five years
later that he came hither to make a permanent abode. The lead mines were the
chief attraction, but after a brief sojourn at Platte river, on what is known as
the Block House branch, he and his party retired to Galena, not being strong
enough to hold their own in a country possessed by hostile Indians. Early in
1828, Col. Brigham and his associates took up a position in the Blue Mounds,
still mining for lead. Food supplies, at .first procured from Galena, were
afterwards obtained from Fort Winnebago, and it was while returning from Fort
Winnebago that the beauties of the Lake country were first discovered by Col.
Brigham. The Indians had told him about the lakes, but the beautiful reality
vastly exceeded their description. The pioneer is not always capable of
appreciating the picturesque, but the colonel predicted the greatness of the
village that would be built where Madison now stands, being impressed by the
charms of the scene, and he even assumed that the capital of the Territory and
State would be here located.

  The first comers to this county were widely severed from their nearest
friends. Dodgeville was the residence of their next door neighbor, and to the
southeast they could call upon somewhat distant acquaintances on the O'Plaine
river, hardly twelve miles from Chicago. Col. Juneau was located near the
junction of the Milwaukee and Menomonee rivers, laying the foundations of the
beautiful Cream City, which is now the commercial metropolis of Wisconsin. It
will be seen at once that every settlement in those days had to rely mainly upon
its own means of defense against the Indians, who were established in populous
villages in every direction. As a rule there was a good understanding, and from
time to time treaties were made defining the boundaries of the new comers, but
the stipulations of the natives were extended and broken repeatedly. So slowly
did the people migrate hitherwards, that Col. Brigham was still the nearest
settler when the capital was located, and his residence was distant twenty-five
miles. Gov. Lewis Cass, the chief executive of Michigan Territory, had
jurisdiction from the earliest settlement, and he made Col. Brigham the first
justice ever appointed here, but his office was almost a sinecure during the
four years that he retained the honor. The difficulties under which these hardy
miners opened up their lucrative calling cannot readily be made to appear to the
modern reader. The traveler of to-day is transported in a few hours from Madison
to Chicago, can dispatch the business of the day in the metropolis of the
northwest and return, without a sense of fatigue or a stain of travel, to his
home at night, but there was no such luxury possible to the adventurous colonel
and his companions who sent their product to Green Bay, Galena or Chicago, and
who had not a wagon track to guide them toward the village which has now
expanded to the colossal proportions of Chicago. That mighty Babylon was then an
insignificant village, in which there seemed to be no probability that the
people would master the difficulties incident to the position and render it
habitable in the better sense. The old colonel was naturally and fitly included
in the earliest attempts to organize a government in this territory, when the
severance from Michigan was effected in 1836, and for very many years he was
identified with the succeeding forms of administration.

  A trip from Green Bay to Prairie du Chien, on horseback, was undertaken for
the first time in May, 1829, by Judge Doty, afterwards Governor, and two
attorneys of the first named settlement, Henry S. Baird and Morgan L. Martin,
guided by a Menomonee Indian whose acquaintance with the country was by no means
perfect; but their seven days pilgrimage made them conversant with the
topographical features of Lake Winnebago, Fond du Lac, Green Lake, our own Four
Lakes, the site of our city, the Blue Mounds and Dodgeville, besides the vast
range of country included in their interesting detour. There had been many
transits by the Fox and "Wisconsin to the Mississippi, since the days of Pere
Marquette and his voyageurs, hut this, so far as can be known, was the first
journey made by white men overland. Three years later Judge Doty again visited
this spot, having been much impressed by its beauty, and being desirous to see a
town started in the midst of so much natural grandeur.

  The ambitious designs of Black Hawk, who had obtained an ascendency over the
braves of his own and of neighboring tribes, led to a disastrous war with the
Indians in 1832, as already indicated, and the settlers of this portion of
Wisconsin were not backward during that eventful period. There was an actual
alliance between the deceitful Winnebagoes and the more immediate followers of
Black Hawk, the Sacs and Foxes, some time before hostilities were openly
commenced; but the savages were full of protestations as to their peaceful and
friendly disposition. Col. Brigham could not be hoodwinked by their flatteries,
and he, with the cooperation of his little army of industry, built a block house
fort, on the prairie, near Blue Mounds, as part of their system of defense.
"When hostile demonstrations were anticipated, the whole of the settlers near at
hand, with their families, congregated within the palisade that surrounded the
main buildings. The Winnebagoes were still persistent as to their friendship and
alliance, until the beginning of June, 1832, although there is good reason for
believing that they were supplying information and help to their more warlike
neighbors, long before that date. Preparations for war were made, regardless of
the Winnebago promises, as it was well known that Black Hawk's followers would
cause trouble without much delay. The commanding officer at Mound Fort, Capt.
John Sherman, saw the probability of war to be so imminent that he communicated
his apprehensions to Col. Dodge, afterwards governor, and the colonel marched to
the reenforcement of Sherman with two hundred men, collected from other and less
exposed positions in the mining districts. Shortly-after this timely aid
arrived, James Aubrey, the first commander at the fort, was killed near the
residence of Col. Brigham, while procuring water from a spring. The Sac Indians
killed him, being guided to 0 their ambush by the treacherous Winnebagoes,
within a few days of the time when they were most lavish in expressions of
friendship. Their part in the murder was surmised, but not known, at the time of
Aubrey's death. A second ambush was planned, and succeeded on the 20th of the
month, fourteen days after the death of Aubrey. The savages having made their
dispositions for the purpose, caused some few of their body to reveal themselves
to the occupants of the fort. Lieut. Force, accompanied by a comrade named
Green, the latter leaving his wife and children in the stockade, made a
reconnoisance, in the course of which they were decoyed by the retiring Indians
into a trap laid for the destruction of a much larger body. Force and Green
fought and maneuvered with bravery and skill, but they were so completely
enmeshed that there was no possibility of escape. The savages mutilated their
victims in a shameful manner after death. The watch worn by Lieut. Force was
subsequently recovered from the body of a dead Indian, by a trader named Wallis
Rowan. The red man, overtaken by fatigue, had apparently lain down to rest, and
in that way was destroyed by a prairie fire. The efforts and the deaths of Force
and Green were seen from Mound Fort.

  Notwithstanding these cruel and purposeless successes, the Indians were
pursued by the main body of settlers and troops, under the command of Col.
Dodge, over the Crawfish, near Aztalan, across the site of this city, to the
north end of Monona, and at Catfish Ford, a brisk engagement with the rear guard
of the flying foe, taught the Indians what they might expect in the way of
punishment. One Indian was shot sitting upon the newly-made grave of his squaw,
having calmly taken that position apparently with the hope that he would thus
readily join her in the Happy Hunting Grounds. Eventually the Black Hawk war was
ended by decisive battles, the only kind of argument that can be conclusive with
savages, and nearly the whole of the red skins that had been in arms were
killed^ captured or dispersed. Black Hawk and his accomplice, the Prophet, who
had buoyed up the tribes with delusive promises, were surrendered to General
Street, at Prairie du Chien, on the 27th of August, 1832, by the chiefs of their
own people, One-Eyed Decorra and Cha-E. Tar. The treaty with the Sacs and Foxes,
made at Rock Island in September of that year, happily terminated the Indian
difficulties of Wisconsin.

  Shortly after the Black Hawk war had been crushed out, the attractions of this
site brought settlers here, and on the 15th of October, 1832, an encampment was
made by Capt. Low, James Halpin and Archibald Crisman, on Mendota Lake ridge.
There were numerous Indians then located on the city site, having been
concentrated here by the facilities offered by a French trader, whose abode was
on the ground now crossed by Johnson street. Rowan, the Indian trader into whose
hands the watch of Lieut. Force fell as lawful spoil, had long before taken up
his location in this neighborhood. Mr. Abel Rasdall, a native of Kentucky,
another early resident, commenced his Wisconsin experiences as a lead miner, and
thence diverging into the avocation of an Indian trader, was connected by
marriage with a Winnebago woman. After her death, he married another of the same
tribe, but she eventually migrated west with her own people, and her husband was
not entirely inconsolable. Rasdall had been for a considerable time a prosperous
trader among the Indians before the war commenced, but during the continuance of
hostilities with Black Hawk, Abel Rasdall was one of the readiest and most
daring of our volunteers. He continued a resident in Dane county until his death
at Token Creek, in 1857, when he was fifty-two years old. After the conclusion
of his Indian engagements, Mr. Rasdall took to himself a wife of his own race in
this city, and raised a family as the result of that marriage. He had traded in
Dane county, and more especially around the Four Lakes, since the year before
the Black Hawk war.

  From the time of the first colony planted in Illinois by La Salle, in 1678-9,
the Canadian voyagers and colonists had customarily intermarried with the
Indians with, as a rule, no other result than that the more civilized race was
absorbed by the other, and the result did not exhibit a corresponding increase
of capacity to appropriate the advantages of civilization. Some of the half
breeds were sharp and dangerous, but few are known as estimable men. One of the
earliest traders here seems to have been an exception to that rule. His name was
Michel St. Cyr, son of a Canadian Frenchman, by a Winnebago. Living always on
the frontier and among the Indians, he had not participated in the advantages of
schools, but he bore an excellent character as a man of veracity, a virtue not
always found associated with civilization, although certainly a part of the
highest. St. Cyr was one of the traders in the Four Lake country, dividing his
attention between the traffic by which he made money and a small garden, that
gave him and his Winnebago children a subsistence. His cabin served occasionally
as a caravanserai and something more, when travelers visited the lakes.
Eventually St. Cyr sold out his improvements to Col. Slaughter, and retired to
the Winnebago reservation in Iowa. His sons were considered worthless, even by
the Indians, and that atom of civilization was utterly erased. The F. F. V.'s
would not trace their lineage to Pocahontas, if the husband of that lady had
been domiciliated among the tribes, and if the result of that marriage had been
given over to Indian customs and general training.

  Preliminary steps for the survey of the lands in this locality were taken by
the general government in 1834, and before the end of the year, that duty had
been completed. The survey and plat of this city were made under special
directions from Judge Doty, who had long before that time been impressed by the
beauty of this site and its surroundings. The further proceedings of the early
settlers must be dealt with in a future chapter.


Additional Comments:
Extracted from:

History of Madison Section

MADISON, DANE COUNTY AND SURROUNDING TOWNS;
BEING A HISTORY AND GUIDE
TO PLACES OF SCENIC BEAUTY AND HISTORICAL NOTE FOUND IN THE TOWNS OF DANE COUNTY
AND SURROUNDINGS, INCLUDING THE ORGANIZATION OF THE TOWNS, AND EARLY INTERCOURSE
OF THE SETTLERS WITH THE INDIANS, THEIR CAMPS, TRAILS, MOUNDS, ETC.

WITH A COMPLETE LIST OF
COUNTY SUPERVISORS AND OFFICERS,
AND
LEGISLATIVE MEMBEES, MADISON VILLAGE AND CITY COUNCIL.

ILLUSTRATED,
MADISON, WIS.:
PUBLISHED BY WM. J. PARK & CO.,

BOOKSELLERS, STATIONERS AND BINDERS, 11 KING STREET.
1877.

COPYRIGHT.
WM. J. PARK & CO. 1877.

DAVID ATWOOD, STEREOTYPER AND PRINTER, MADISON, WIS.


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