HISTORY OF THE CHIPPEWA VALLEY - CHAPTER 10


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Faithful Record of all Important Events, Incidents, and
Circumstances that have Transpired in the Valley of the
Chippewa from its Earliest Settlement by White People,
Indian Treaties, Organization of the Territory and State;
Also of the Counties Embracing the Valley, Senatorial,
Assembly and Congressional Districts, and a Brief
Biographical Sketch of the Most Prominent Persons in the
Settlement of the Valley. BY Thomas E. Randall 1875.  Free
Press Print.  Eau Claire, Wisconsin

CHAPTER 10

From 1850 to 1854, few events of general public interest
occurred in this valley. Emigration was directed mostly
towards the young giant growing up to the west of us, and
California still claimed the attention of the adventurous.

Some changes took place in the proprietorship of some of the
mills.

Perhaps some of my readers, who have come here from the 'Old
Pine State,' will remember the name of Captain Stover Rines,
who figures so prominently in the northwestern border of the
State of Maine war, as a tall resolute captain in the army
of defense in the winter of 1836-7.

Having removed to Janesville, in this State, some years
previous, the captain made a trip up this river in 1848, and
bought and interest with H.S. Allen at the Falls, and
removed his family thither the following summer. He came,
however, like many others, not to stay, but to make a
'raise,' which he did in a couple of years by inducing his
partner to buy back his interest. Moses Rines, his brother,
who had bought in at the same time, continued in the firm.
Jacob Wills, brother of Sam Wills of this city, who for many
years foreman of the Eau Galle mills, soon after became
owner of the same property.

Some such changes also occurred in Eau Claire. Cady sold his
interest to a young man named Swim, and Simon Randall sold
his interest to a Mr. Pope, and bought out Captain Dix in
the mill on the lower dam. These three firms continued to do
business thus organized for the whole period named; the
former under the name of H.S. Allen and Company, and the two
Eau Claire firms with the titles respectively Gage, Reed,
and Randall; and Stone, Swim and Company.

During one of these years, an incident happened to the last
named firm, so unusual in modern business affairs, that I
cannot forebear mentioning it.

Like all other lumbering firms, these men used their credit
to help them over the long winter months, when not of the
avails of their operations could be realized to meet
expenses. Among others who trusted them with goods, was a
Mr. Sincere, of Galena, then it its palmiest days as the
grand entrepot of lumbermen's supplies. This dealer had
exacted the promise, that he should be paid out of the first
raft that came down in the spring; abut, as several others
holding similar claims on the floating chattels must be paid
also, Mr. Swim found it necessary to cut this creditor
short, and asked him to wait until the next raft should come
down, whereupon the obliging merchant procured a warrant
under the laws existing in Illinois, and threw his debtor in
prison, and keep him there (although no fraud or attempt at
fraud was alleged) until some of his partners went down and
procured security.

The firm of Colton and Moses completed their mill on the
Yellow River in 1850, and soon after Alex and Henry O'Neil
with Mr. Lockhart from Prairie du Chien, erected the mill on
O'Neil's Creek, now owned by the Stanley Brothers.

This period was marked by determined efforts on the part of
H.S. Allen and Company, to procure cheaper transportation,
and to relieve the rivermen from the terrible hardships of
walking up from Lake Pepin after taking down rafts, there
being only a trail or footpath, along the steep side hills,
and over the sandy plains, by which the raftmen in those
days returned, weary and foot-sore to the mills.

Two projects were started; the first was to build a
steamboat of sufficiently light draught to run over the
sandbars, or the boys termed it; 'To run on heavy dew.'

Captain Matt Harris of Galena had been induced to venture up
to the mouth of the Red Cedar River once, with freight and
passengers on the steamer Doctor Franklin, when the water
was high, but all the Mississippi boats were found to draw
too much water for the river. It was, therefore, resolved to
build one for this trade. But the science of boat building,
had not yet reached the point of constructing a boat that
would carry an engine of sufficient power to propel the
craft against the rapid current, and yet float on six or
eight inches of water; or, if the feat had been achieved,
the builder of the first steamboat on the river - a Mr.
Harlow, from Pittsburgh had not yet acquired the art. The
boat, which, by the way, was named the H.S. Allen, was a
miserable failure, and could only run on the highest
freshets, with any safety, and soon transferred to deeper
rivers. But the year following another boat was built by the
same company, with better success, though failing to meet
the wants of the trade fro more than a part of the season.

The other undertaking was to open a wagon road from North
Pepin to the Falls. Some slight attempt had been made to
start a town at this place, North Pepin, a year or two
earlier, but the country back being entirely unsettled, its
growth was very slow. Now, however, farmers began to stop
their canvas-covered wagons on the best spots along the
route to the Chippewa pineries as the mills were called, and
at one time this village was considered a very strong point.
Colonel Ben Allen, a lawyer and speculator, located there,
and with his aid, and Mr. Colburn's, at Dunnville, a stage
line was started from North Pepin to Chippewa Falls, up one
day and down the next - through the daylight, for $3. Cheap
jolting, we should think now, for a new country.

Early in this period, one farmer located in what is now, Eau
Claire County, the Reverend Mr. Barland who came first alone
then with his amiable family, far in advance of any other
agriculturalist, and settled on the farm, he and the family
now occupy, on the Sparta Road, two miles from this city. He
had divine services at the mill, on stated Sabbaths for
several years.

The Methodist Episcopal Church, too, always alive in the
interests of religion, and ready with its perfect church
machinery to promote its welfare in remote corners through
its Wisconsin Conference, sent a preacher of that order into
the valley, in the summer of 1852, by the name of Mayne, a
young man from England, quiet, humble, and zealous, but
unequal to the task of planting a Christian amongst so many
opposing elements, as he found here; and his appointments at
the Falls, and Eau Claire, were discontinued after a few
months, but not before a boat crew of wild fellows, from the
Falls while stopping over night at Eau Claire, had assailed
him with stones and missiles, while he was addressing a
meeting held for divine service in the dinning hall of Gage,
Reed and Company.

The mills on the Eau Galle and Red Cedar, during this period
were steadily advancing in wealth and improvements, being
secure in able to defy the highest freshets, they had
nothing to do but grow rich by silent profits, and
persevering industry.

Far otherwise was it with the mill company at the Falls, who
every winter spent large sums in erecting piers, renewing
booms, and strengthening their works to secure logs, a
charter granting ample privileges having been obtained from
the Legislature for that purpose, and so determined was the
company to make all secure, that piers costing more than a
thousand dollars each were placed in the river; booms with
heavy iron fastenings were attached and every part of those
vast structures seemed perfect and impregnable against all
freshets. The capacity of the mills was every year enlarged,
and in the winter of 1854-5, a very large amount of logs was
put in to supply the season's cutting; the spring drive was
good, lumber sold readily and at a good price and all the
affairs of the company seemed flourishing, but by a strange
and sudden freak of nature all these hopes were cut short in
a day.

But little rain fell from early in April until the sixth of
July, when a dark cloud formed directly over the territory
drained by the Chippewa, clearly visible from this place and
the Falls, but dark masses of clouds could be seen rolling
and gathering from every direction into that one spot in the
heavens, accompanied by fearful peals of thunder that made
the earth tremble, and continued for about thirty hours,
appearing every moment as though it were coming down on us,
but actually spending all its force in that single locality.

The consequence was a sudden and terribly destructive rise
in the river, bringing down vast quantities of logs and
driftwood, which drove with such force against those piers,
that the channel was soon cleared of all obstructions and
more than seventy thousand logs (twenty-five million board
feet) together with piers and booms, were carried away and
scattered all over the bottoms and amongst the sloughs of
the lower Chippewa. The mill race, too, was badly damaged,
and no more lumber could be made that year, which, when
consider that 100,000 feet was being manufactured every day
before the unfortunate flood, and that every thousand feet
was worth twenty dollars in gold, makes the loss very great.

"The last straw" it is said, "breaks the camels back," and
this was a very large straw, which contributed very much to
the final downfall of the company.

Previous to the winter of 1856, there had been since the
removal of Mr. Bass no administration of justice, in this
valley. After the organization of Jackson County, these
settlements were attached to that for judicial purposes, and
as several grave offenses had been committed subjecting the
county to great expenses to bring the offenders to trial,
the necessity became imperative to form a new county, which
was called Chippewa, and embraced all the settlements in the
valley above the Red Cedar.

The act was passed in 1853, and a town and county board
organized the following spring. The same Legislature also
created the eighth Judicial District, and the new county
part of the same.

One of the crimes referred to above, was wherein the party
was accused of manslaughter in the first degree, was taken
to Black River Falls for trial, but as the law creating the
new district had just passed, he was discharged for want of
jurisdiction, and strange as it may seem, was never again
apprehended.

The first Judicial election in this new district, resulted
in the election of Judge S.N. Full, to the bench of the
circuit, who held his first court at Chippewa Falls, in
January 1854, the only attorney present, being our now
distinguished and highly esteemed Judge Humphrey, who
unanimously retained for the people by the County Board.