A History of the City of Cairo, Illinois [1 ed.] 9780809386598, 9780809307623

Citation preview

Lansden

Illinois / American History Lying at the confluence of the Ohio and Mississippi rivers, Cairo is a city that looks both south and north. Its location was to become vital to the North during the Civil War, and its character was shaped by its southern experience. Cairo was incorporated in 1818, the year Illinois was admitted into the Union. John M. Lansden’s history is especially rich and rewarding for its account of post-colonial times in the Illinois country, for its detail of the role of Cairo during the Civil War, and for its description of the economic, social, and political forces that shaped a major early settlement in Illinois. Lansden, a Cairo lawyer for fifty-seven years, had a passion for accuracy and spent thirty years researching and writing this book, first published in 1910 when he was seventy-four years old. The accompanying portraits, photographs, maps, and drawings provide an important additional source of information and help to illuminate the text.

A History of the City of CAIRO Illinois

A HISTORY OF THE CITY OF

CAIRO ILLINOIS

John M. Lansden was born in Sangamon County, Illinois, in 1836. He attended Cumberland University, in Tennessee, and Illinois College, at Jacksonville. He earned his law degree at the Albany Law School, New York, in 1865, and in 1866 moved to Cairo where he practiced law until his death in 1923. He was Cairo’s city attorney in 1870 and mayor in 1871–72.

Southern Illinois University Press

Printed in the United States of America Cover photograph: Riverlore, Cairo, Illinois, by C. William Horrell, from Land Between the Rivers: The Southern Illinois Country by C. William Horrell, Henry Dan Piper, and John W. Voight.

Lansden_cvr_CDDC.indd 1

ISBN 0-8093-2936-0 ISBN 978-0-8093-2936-6

Southern Illinois University Press

1915 University Press Drive Mail Code 6806 Carbondale, IL 62901 www.siu.edu/~siupress

John M. Lansden Foreword by Clyde C. Walton With Maps and Illustrations

6/15/09 10:25:34 AM

A HISTORY OF THE CITY OF CAIRO, ILLINOIS

A Flistory of the City of

CAIRO Illinois By John M. I~ansden T17ith a Foreword by Clyde C. Walton With Maps and Illustrations

SOUTHERN ILLINOIS UNIVERSITY PRESS Carbondale

Copyright © 1910, 2009 by John M. Lansden Foreword copyright © 1976, 2009 by Clyde C. Walton All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America 12 11 10 09

4 3 2 1

The Library of Congress has cataloged the original issue of this book as follows: Lansden, John McMurray A history of the city of Cairo, Illinois. Reprint of the 1910 ed. published by R.R. Donnelley, Chicago. Includes index 1. Cairo, Ill.—History. I. Alexander-Pulaski W. S. Bicenteniial Commission. II. Alexander Co., Ill. Board of County Commissioners. III. Lansden, Robert L. IV. Title. F549.C2L29 1976 997.3'999 75-38699 ISBN 978-0-8093-2936-6 ISBN 0-8093-2936-0 ISBN 978-0-8093-0762-3 ISBN 0-8093-0762-6

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, $16,=’

This new edition of A History of the City of Cairo, lllinoi!' is dedicated to Effie A. Lansc\en (1872-1941) (Miss Effie) Library Clerk, 1895-1903, Assistant Librarian, 1903-1922, and Librarian, 1922-1941, Cairo Public Library (A. B. Safford Memorial Library) and

David Van del' Burgh Lansden (1905 -1973) Cairo Lawyer, ] 93 3-1973

TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE CHAPTER I

13

SKETCH OF THE ILLINOIS COUNTRY CHAPTER

II 18

EARLY FRENCH EXPLORERS AND MISSIONARY PRIESTS CHAPTER III

25

THE ILLINOIS TERRITORIAL GOVERNMENT CHAPTER IV THE CITY OF CAIRO OF

1818

• 30

CHAPTER V THE SITE AND PLACE FROM

1818

TO

1836

39

CHAPTER VI THE CITY OF CAIRO OF 1836 TO 1846. - THE ILl,INOIS CENTRAL RAILROAD COMPANY OF 1836. THE ILLINOIS EXPORT1NG CoMPANY. THE CAIRO CITY AND CANAL COMPANY

41

CHAPTER VII THE CAIRO CITY AND CANAL COMPANY SUCCEEDED BY THE CAIRO CITY PROPERTY TRUS'f.-CAIRO FROM JUNE 13, I846, TO DECEMBER 23, 1853 •

58

CHAPTER VIII CAIRO'S SITE AND ITS ABRASIONS BY THE RIVERS. - LEVEES AND LEVEE CONSTRUCTION. - THE HIGHEST KNOWN FLOODS

63

CHAPTER IX Low LOTS AND GROUNDS. SEEPAGE. - THE LINEGAR BILL. STREET FILLING. - CITY INDEBTEDNESS •

79

CHAPTER X THE WHARF AND WHARFAGE.

RIPARIAN RIGHTS

CHAPTER XI GEOLOGICAL FORMATIONS. - THE SIGNAL STATION. RIVER GAUGE. - TEMPERATURES, RAIN FALLS, ETC. CHAPTER XII THE ILLINOIS CENTRAL RAILROAD

Vll

THE 90

V1l1

TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER XIII

MAPS AND PLATS

• I II

CHAPTER XIV THE OHIO AND MISSISSIPPI RIVERS. - THE TERRITORY DRAINED. - DISTANCES. - THE OHIO RIVER AS A BOUNDARY • 116 CHAPTER XV THE HEALTH OF THE CITY CHAPTER XVI CAIRO DURING THE WAR

• 120 128

CHAPTER XVII THE CHURCHES CHAPTER XVIII THE SCHOOLS· CHAPTER XIX THE

A. B.

SAFFORD MEMORIAL LIBRARY. THE WOMAN'S CLUB AND LIBRARY ASSOCIATION.-ST. MARY'S INFIRMARY. -THE UNITED STATES MARINE HOSPITAL 153 CHAPTER XX

THE TRUSTEES OF THE CAIRO CITY PROPERTY. - THE TRUSTEES OF THE CAIRO TRUST PROPERTY. - THEIR EARLY CIVIL ENGINEERS. - THE CAIRO NEWSPAPERS 157 CHAPTER XXI CAIRO IN SERVITUDE TO LAND COMPANIES CHAPTER XXII THE AMERICAN NOTES

170

CHAPTER XXIII THE TOWN GOVERNMENT OF Two YEARS AND THE CITY GovERNMENT OF FIFTY-THREE YEARS. - THE SEVENTEEN MAYORS 177 CHAPTER XXIV DARIUS BLAKE HOLBROOK. - MILES A. GILBERT. - SAMUEL STAATS TAYLOR. WILLIAM PARKER HALLIDAY. - HALLIDAY BROTHERS 190 CHAPTER XXV THE GROWTH OF "THE THREE STATES"

• 208

TABLE

OF CONTENTS

CHAPTER

lX

XXVI

ALEXANDER COUNTY AND ITS OTHER TOWNS, AND ITS EARLIEST SETTLERS' • 21 I

XXVII

CHAPTER

HARRELL'S SHORT HISTORY. - THE HISTORY OF ALEXANDER, UNION AND PULASKI CoUN'l'IES • :2 I

7

XXVIII

CHAPTER

OnlER RAILROADS. THE ILLINOIS CENTRAL AND THE THEBES RAILROAD BRIDGES. THE CAIRO HARBOR AND BACON ROCK. THE FERRIES, CAIRo'S NEED OF • 220 CHAPTER

XXIX

CAIRO BANKS.-BUILDING AND LOAN ASSOCIATIONS.-THE CUSTOM HOUSE. THE HALLIDAY HOTEL. - THE SPRINGFIELD BLOCK. - THE CoURT OF COMMON PLEAS • 231 CHAPTER

XXX

EXTRACTS FROM BOOKS, PAMPHLETS AND LETTERS CHAPTER

XXXI

FORT JEFFERSON.-BIRD'S POINT AND THE BIRDS CHAPTER

. 240

255

XXXII

MISCELLANEOUS PAPERS. - JUDGES OF THE SUPREME, CIRCUIT AND CoUNTY COURTS. - :MEMBERS OF THE LEGISLATURE AND OTHER BODIES. - COUNTY, CITY AND OTHER OFFICERS. - LISTS OF EARLY RESIDENTS OF THE CITY, ETC. • 261 CHAPTER CAIRO AS A BUSINESS PLACE. INDEX

XXXIII

THE FUTURE OF THE CITY

• 280

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS John M. Lansden Details of Map of I7I8 and 1755 Survey of Township Seventeen, 1807 Shadrack Bond Elias Kent Kane Thompson's Survey of 1837 Chancellor Kent's Letter of 1838 Galena Celebration, 1838 Certificate of Stock in C. C. & C. Company Junction of Rivers (1858) Map of Proposed Canal, r838 Judge Sydney Breese Strickland and Taylor's Map of 1838 Generals Grant and McClernand River Gunboats, Cairo, 1861 First School House A. B. Safford Memorial Library St. Mary's Infirmary Cairo in r841 Mayors of Cairo Mayors of Cairo Darius B. Holbrook Miles A. Gilbert Samuel Staats Taylor William P. Halliday Thebes Court House, 1845 Cairo Court HOllse, 1864 Illillois Central Railroad Bridge Thebes Railroad Bridge Cairo-Kaskaskia Bank Bills Custom House and Post Office Building Alexander M. Jenkins U.S. Battleship Concord

xi

Facing Page Frontispiece 24

25 36 37

44 45 54

55 78

79 IIO III

128 12 9 152

153 15 6 157

182 18 3

190 19 1

196 197 214 21 5 226

227 232 233 23 8 239

FOREWORD By Clyde C. Walton AIRO is as far south as you can go and still be in the state of Illinois. The city is located at the far tip of Illinois, where the Ohio River joins the Mississippi on its unending flow into the distant Gulf of Mexico. Today Cairo lives secure behind the mighty levees that protect it from ravage by the two rivers. But it was not always so. For although Cairo exists because the two rivers, and generally owes whatever measure of prosperity it enjoys to the rivers, it has also suffered enormously because of them. Indeed, the city has a never ending lovehate relationship with the Ohio and Mississippi rivers. The city of Cairo is in its history as in its physical location entirely unique. Far and away the most useful and the most detailed study of that unique history is the volume written by John M. Lansden, entitled A History of tbe City of Cairo, Illinois. It was published, with many maps and illustrations, by R. R. Donnelley & Sons Company of Chicago in 1910. The book has long been out of print, and is much sought after by libraries and by collectors. It is now republished in this bicentennial year as a service to all those concerned with nineteenth-century urban development. The author, John M. Lansden, was born in New Berlin, Sangamon County, Illinois, in 1836. He attended, first, a pioneer Illinois institution of higher education, Illinois College in Jacksonville and, next, Cumberland University in Tcnnessee. He moved East to continue his studies, and was graduated from the Albany Law School in New York state in 1865. He cast about for a place to begin his career, and chose Cairo because he was much impressed hy its potential for a great future. Be arrived in the city in 1866 and entered into the practice of law with Louis Houck, but this association ended when Houck left Cairo for an extended career in business in Cape Missouri, in 1869. Lansden then founded his own firm and, indeed, it survives to this day. It is the oldest law firm in Illinois in continuous service in which there has always been a principal who is also a direct male descendant of the founder. Lansden married the daughter of David A, Smith, a prominent Illinois attorney. The couple had six children~two boys and four girls. From the marriage of his elder son, a hlwyer, too, came three children: David, John, and Robert. David and John both died in 1973, but today Robert continues the family law firm in Cairo. It is Robert L. Lansden who is in large part responsible for this republication of his grandfather's A History of the City of Cairo, lliinois.

C

Xlll

XIV

FOREWORD

John .M. Lansden had a lifelong interest in the history of his city. He gathered materials about Cairo history from many sources and for many years. His daughter, Miss Effie A. Lansden, served the Cairo Public Library as chief librarian for a considerable period of time. It follows that the strength of the Cairo Public Library's history collection reflects John M. Lansden's influence. Lansden read and studied many original letters, documents, ledgers, and related documents whose location is now unknown and which now must be presumed to be lost. It is in part because he unearthed so much original matel'ial and made such careful use of it that the book continues to be such a storehouse of reliable historical information. Interestingly enough, he was 74 years old when the book was published. The author used the best sources available to him for his review of American and Illinois history which preceded the founding of Cairo. But he is at his best when he is digesting, synthesizing original documents and rare pamphlet materials, when he is reporting on events that occurred after he arrived in Cairo in 1866, and when he is writing about people he had known personally. And frequently the reader is pleasantly surprised when he comes across a sentence or two, or perhaps a paragraph, that demonstrates Lansden's considerable literary skill. For example, see how he described the significance of the isolated outpost of Kaskaskia to those French who were able to make only infrequent visits: It was indeed a resting place, and the society and customs, the religion and amusements, they there found were to them like a return to their own beloved France. It was civilized existence again, darkly shaded, it may be, by the aboriginal life that everywhere breathed over the face of the vast country. But to those who dwelt there, and perhaps more to the sojourners for a time, the shadow of Indian life served only to brighten by contrast the short and narrow strip of country which there skirted the great river. It appears that he made an effort to put the best construction possible upon the maneuverings and schemes of the early promoters of the city, upon the somewhat dubious activities of the later Trustees of Cairo City Property, and, above all, upon the role played by the Illinois Central Railroad. In his discussion of early levee problems he points out how the city government and the railroad worked closely together, saying of one mayor, "He did not own the City Council, but had he owned it, the unanimity could not have been more unanimous." And later in the same chapter, apparently believing he had perhaps said more than some would approve, he added: To much that I have said in this chapter objection will no doubt be made; but it must be remembered that I am writing a history of Cairo, and that large parts of it relate to the Trustees and the Illinois Central Railroad Company. It was their city by birth and should have been theirs for nurture and not for exploitation. I might have written a history of Cairo and filled it full of nice things about everybody, corporations, land-trusts and all; but it would not have been history. Cairo's histOlY is a history of facts, hard facts, most of them and most of the time.

FOREWORD

xv

Please note, however, that when it became possible to consider this republication of Lansden's Hist01'Y of tbe City af Cairo, Itlinais, both because of the pressures of time and because it was clear that the boole could easily stand on its own merits, it was decided to rei~sue the book without correcting such minor errors as it eontained and without bringing it up to date. And this is what has been done, with the exceptions of a few of the more elaborate illustrations, including the large, folding map which was tipped in between pages 30-31 (it presented impossible technical problems). But at the same time, please recognize that, for example, the language used in reporting the lynching of William James (November 11, 1909) is that of the first decade of the twentieth century and should be read in that context. It seems hardly necessary to point out that a historian reviewing this disgraceful incident would use language markedly different from that used in this book and would in fact present the lynching in a modern and different perspective. With this caveat, I join with all those who now will find it possible to own a copy of this hitherto scarce and elusive history of a unique Illinois community. Lansden's History of tbe City of Cairo, Illinois is an important, early Illinois m-ban history, and it is particularly appropriate that it is republished in this bicentennial year.

Northern Illinois University 23 September 1975

PREFACE HAVE lived in Cairo forty years and during all that time have been engaged in the practice of the profession of the law. I ought, therefore, to be fairly well acquainted with what has taken place, during that time, in and concerning the city and which was worthy of record or of a place in its history. For many years I have preserved papers and documents relating to the city, not at first with a view to writing a history thereof, but just as anyone would preserve papers or documents he regarded as of more than usual interest. These have so accumulated that I have felt I could in no other way do a better service for the people of Cairo than by using them and other materials in the preparation of a history of the city. Besides this, 1 have not known of anyone who had in contemplation the undertaking here attempted. In the year r864, Mr. Moses B. Harrell, then long a resident of Cairo, wrote an excellent short history of the city, and the same became the first fifty pages of a city directory of that year. The History of Alexander, Union, and Pulaski Counties, published in 1883, twenty-seven years ago, contains three several parts relating to Cairo. These parts were written by Mr. H. C. Bradsby, who had before that time resided in Cairo many years. The book is a large one and contains many biographical sketches of citizens of Cairo. There are quite a number of copies of this history in the city I suppose; but of Mr. Harrell's history, there are now only a very few copies. This history must necessarily contain much that is found in the other two, just as the second contains much that is found in the first; but I have found a great deal which I have deemed worthy of permanent record, which is not embraced in either of the other two books; and further, many matters merely touched upon in them I have presented much more fully. It will be seen that the book contains much historical information about that part of our country which embraces our city, county and state-information that might have been omitted without affecting the local history; but it is believed little of it will be found so foreign to the local history as to seem wholly out of place. Local history would be very local indeed, which did not here and there show the relation of the

I

xvii

xviii

PREFACE

locality to much that was outside and pertained to the country at large. Then, too, I have desired to create, in some small degree at least, a desire in the younger people of our community to know more of this part of the Valley of the Mississippi-this Illinois Country, in some respects the richest part naturally of the United States. I have not been able to devote much time or space to biographical sketches. Ordinarily, it is quite difficult enough to choose between what ought and ought not to go into a local history like this. The book should be a history of the city and not of individuals, excepting, of course, of those persons who have been so identified with its establishment and growth that a history of it with them left out would seem very incomplete.

J. M. L. Cairo, Illinois, September,

1910.

A History of tbe City of Cairo, Illinois

HISTORY OF CAIRO CHAPTER I SKETCH OF THE ILLINOIS COUNTRY

HE geographical position of this place, at the junction of the two rivers, requires, it seems to me, a somewhat full account of the attention given it before any attempt was made to establish a city here, which was in the year 1818. This account may, therefore, be called the introductory chapter.

T

The colonial grants to Virginia of May 23, 1609, and of March 12, 1612, were for territory extending "from sea to sea, West and Northwest/' or from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean. It was not then known how far westward it was to the Pacific coast; and the uncertainty about the western boundary of the grants afforded grounds for the territorial disputes which subsequently arose. The French had entered the country by way of the St. Lawrence quite as early as the English had entered it further southward; and the former, pushing westward and southward, crossed these so-called sea-tosea grants, which to them had nothing more than a mere paper existence. They, also, not long afterward, came into the country on the south and by way of the Mississippi River. Their claims to the country were based on the right of discovery and on other grounds not necessary to be noticed here. They established posts here and there in their widely extended dominions. Differences now and then arose between the authorities in Canada and those at New Orleans. Both claimed jurisdiction over the Illinois country, which embraced the whole country between the Ohio and the Mississippi rivers and west of Canada. But these jealousies of each other never interfered with their hearty co-operation against the English. All told, their numbers in the whole country were less than one-tenth that of the English; but they went everywhere and easily obtained favor with the original occupants of the country. Religion, business and amusement went hand in hand; and soon it became apparent that New France was to extend from the Gulf to the Great Lakes and thence eastward to the Alleghanies, and that the English were to have nothing west of that mountain range. Nothing shows so clearly the character and extent of the French claim as the fact that it I3

14

HISTORY OF THE CITY OF CAIRO

embraced the Ohio River country and reached to the present site of Pittsburg, where they established their Fort Du Quesne. The English, seeing their sea-to-sea grants so wholly disregarded, began to assert their supposed superior rights. They saw that should the French acquire permanent lodgment in the Valley of the Mississippi as they had in the Valley of the St. Lawrence and along the Great Lakes, they would be shut in by the Alleghanies and confined to the Atlantic coast. These territorial disputes, to which we can only make the barest reference, extended over well-nigh a century and a half. A few years of peace now and then ensued; but on the whole, a well-established state of controversy existed all the time. The two great nations were the actual claimants, and often the controversy in the new world was but the counterpart of that in the old, between the same parties. The English saw plainly that if they were not to be shut in by that coast range of mountains, they must maintain their asserted territorial lines by force of arms. The country was not uninhabited. The Indians were everywhere. Wherever one went in the great broad land, he found himself within the bounds of some one of its innumerable tribes. The contending parties took little account of these early occupants. Each enlisted their aid against the other. In the one case, the Indian was to help the Frenchman for the Frenchman's sake; in the other, the Englishman for the Englishman's sake; but all the while, the contest was for the land and country the Indian himself claimed. It was long a state of war, interrupted now and then by stirring events elsewhere. Canada was now and then entered, held, and abandoned by tIle English. Finally, in the year 1755 what proved to be the final struggle came on; and after the lapse of about stven years, the French and Indian or the French and English wars came to an end with the fall of Quebec, and the Treaty of Paris in 1763. It was a great victory. It was a great treaty. It settled the dispute which had lasted one hundred and fifty years. I t cleared every cloud off the I~nglish title and made way for a consolidated empire, which never could have existed with New France between the Alleghanies and the Mississippi. How the fates of nations are decided! Often a single battle, a single mistake in diplomacy, a single failure to grasp the great situation-these sometimes turn nations upside down and turn the current of events the world over. The new world, or our part of it, was the prize between the Anglo-Saxon and the Latin. They were both seeking to establish great colonies-seeking to reproduce themselves upon the newest and most fertile continent the earth afforded. "Thus terminated a war which originated in an attempt on the part of the French to surround the English colonists and chain them to a narrow strip of country along the coast of the Atlantic, and ended with their giving up the whole of what was their· only valuable territory in North America." "She was utterly stripped of her American possessions, little more than a hamlet being left her in lower Louisiana." (Hinton's United States.)

SKETCH OF THE ILLINOIS COUNTRY

IS

The Illinois country, a.fter thus passing from France to England, was placed under the care of Captain Sterling, who was succeeded by Major Farmer, who in turn was succeeded by Colonel Reed in 1765; in which year the country was annexed to Canada. Reed was succeeded by Colonel Wilkins, whose a.dministration was far more satisfactory than those of his predecessors. Few persons in America and still fewer in England supposed that this victorious peace of 1763 would soon be followed by war between the victors themselves, but it was. The lapse of thirteen ye