the town, which was never afterwards molested by the savages. While the
more extensive fortifications were in process of construction, indeed to
the peace of 1783, the price of provisions in St. Louis was high, and
visitors from New Orleans, Ste. Geneviève, Cahokia, Kaskaskia, and other
settlements nicknamed the place "_Pain Court_," or "short of bread." Still,
it was a time of prosperity. The town grew, and nothing alarming happened
until, in 1785, when the people were terrified by their first sight of the
"June rise" of the Mississippi. They saw the great yellow stream spread out
over the American Bottoms on the east bank and the Columbia Bottom on the
west bank to the north, until it became a vast lake reaching farther than
the eye could distinctly see. They saw the mighty flood go raging past,
black with the trunks of mighty trees torn up by the wild waters, the
villages of Cahokia and Kaskaskia submerged, crops ruined, cattle drowned,
and houses melting into the yellow sea. St. Louis was flooded to what is
now Main Street, and part of the people were preparing to move farther up
the high bank that ran back from the stream, when the waters began to
recede, and the anxiety of the town was relieved. The people called this
"_l'année des grands eaux_,"--"the year of the great waters." There have
been many such floods since, but none more awe-inspiring than this, seen in
a setting of virgin wilderness. The flood increased the population of the
city, however, for the settlers in the bottoms went to town and joined in
its upbuilding. In those days, notwithstanding all the dangers of war and
flood, St. Louis seems to have been a gay place. Society was simple, yet
retaining an indefinable air of elegance that bore the flavor of old
France. Even if they were "short of bread," the people were hospitable, a
trait which still persists characteristic and conspicuous. The French
element has almost wholly disappeared in newer elements, but there yet
lingers, somehow, the atmosphere of deliberate ease among the people, even
in the pressure of modern business. So orderly was this frontier town that
during the entire period of the French and Spanish dominations but one
murder was reported.
[Illustration OLD MOUND, ST. LOUIS, REMOVED IN 1869. FROM A PHOTOGRAPH IN
MISSOURI HISTORICAL SOCIETY COLLECTION.]
Following the annalists we learn that the city's commerce in those early
days was much hampered by a band of pirates that infested the river at a
place called Grand Tower, midway between the mouths of the Missouri and
Ohio. Lurking at this point, where the stream is very swift, the pirates
would dart out and attack the boats plying between New Orleans and St.
Louis, kill the boatmen and seize the goods. They secured rich spoil of
hides from the down trade, and many luxurious articles from the up
trade--treasures even from distant France. One _voyageur_ north bound
escaped the pirates through the strategy and courage of a negro who won the
confidence of the captors of the barge and the sympathy of two negro slaves
of the pirates. At a signal the negroes hurled the buccaneers off the
barge, and either shot them or left them to drown. The barge crew then took
the boat once more, went back to New Orleans, and told their story to the
Governor, who issued an order that all boats leaving for St. Louis should
go in company. In obedience in the spring of 1788 ten barges started up the
river with crews well armed. Arrived at the rendezvous of the robbers they
found none, but they recovered, however, much of the plunder that had been
stored away and brought it to St. Louis. The year of their arrival was
known for generations as "_l'année des dix bateaux_,"--"the year of the ten
boats."
St. Louis traded not only with New Orleans but with Canada as well. The
Indians gave no trouble up stream or down. The Spanish Government wanted
settlers, and was liberal in granting land. We read that "there were no
mails or taverns, but every house was a welcome house to new comers." In
1798 the population of Upper Louisiana was 6028, of whom 1080 were
colored. The population had risen in 1804 to 10,340. In 1803 the Louisiana
Purchase was made, and in 1804 St. Louis "contained one hundred and eighty
houses built of hewn logs and stone, the latter being generally the
rendezvous of the most wealthy, and surrounded by a wall of the same
material, enclosing the whole block, which continued in use many years,
protecting the fine fruit trees, which shaded the mansion." Frame houses
became fashionable after the transfer to the United States. "There were but
one bakery, two small taverns, three blacksmiths, two mills, and one doctor
in the town." Coffee and sugar were $2.00 per pound, and everything else
was costly in proportion. The United States took possession March 10, 1804,
when Major Amos Stoddard assumed the duties of Governor of Upper Louisiana.
Then history began to make quickly.
Near St. Louis, Lewis and Clark organized their expedition via the Missouri
and Columbia rivers to the Pacific Ocean, departing in May, 1804. In August
Lieutenant Zebulon Pike started to explore the Mississippi to its source.
The Mississippi was opened up to free navigation. General William Henry
Harrison came from Indiana to preside over the district. He was succeeded
by General James Wilkinson, and the region formerly known as the District
of Louisiana became known as the Territory of Louisiana. Later a strangely
handsome, dark, romantic man, much honored by every one and indescribably
fascinating in manner, visited the town and was fêted. He was entertained
by General Wilkinson, through whom it is believed the authorities at
Washington first learned of that vast, vague treason which Burr--for it
was he--conceived in his restless brain. Wilkinson was later appointed to
watch Burr and was succeeded as Governor by Captain Meriwether Lewis, fresh
from his adventures in the mysterious Northwest. A ferry had been
established in 1797, and at the same spot there is to-day a ferry
operating, one of the most profitable of the vested interests of St. Louis.
The post-office was established in 1804. In 1810 the population was
fourteen thousand. In 1808 was founded the first newspaper, which exists
to-day as the _St. Louis Republic_, a daring enterprise begun when the
whole country was suffering from the embargo and non-intercourse with
England. The great New Madrid earthquake shook the little city in 1811. The
battle of Tippecanoe had been fought a little before the earthquake, and in
the same year appeared the first steamboat in Western waters. In 1813 the
Territory of Louisiana became the Territory of Missouri, and in June of
that year the Bank of St. Louis was founded. The year before that the
Governor of the Territory had gathered in the city of St. Louis the chiefs
of the Great and Little Osages, the Sacs, Foxes, Delawares, and Shawnees,
made peace with them, then conducted them to Washington, arriving there
just before the declaration of war against Great Britain, in time to
conclude a peace which saved the country from any such conspiracy as had
been formed among the Indian tribes to the east, under the leadership of
the great Tecumseh.
Being a frontier town, St. Louis was of course a resort for trappers and
traders but, unlike the frontier towns of to-day, not for desperadoes. The
early settlers seem to have stamped upon the place its distinctive quality
of quietness. Here the North American Fur Company had its headquarters for
a long time, and from this point the adventurous subordinates of John Jacob
Astor went forth in all directions in search of peltries. One of these, a
Colonel Russell Farnum, leaving St. Louis afoot reached Behring Strait in
1813-14, crossed over the ice, traversed Siberia and, arriving at St.
Petersburg, was presented to the Emperor. This memorable journey was the
wonder of Europe at the time, for Farnum went from St. Petersburg to Paris
and then came home by way of New York. He wrote a record of his adventures
and sent it to a New York publisher but it was lost and the writer died
before he could again transcribe his narrative.
The War of 1812 with Great Britain for a time was of small concern to St.
Louis. Later, however, the Indians of Missouri were armed by the people
and pitted against the Indians employed by the British. The trading-posts
in which St. Louis was interested extended twelve hundred miles to the
north and there agents from St. Louis counter-plotted against the British.
The Yanktons and Omahas were matched by the Americans against the Iowas and
several battles were fought in which the British-bought savages were
worsted. The war coming to an end, Indian hostilities ceased and the fur
trade throve under the peace. Rivals to the American Fur Company were
started. The business expanded, and soon the necessities of commercial
intercourse led to the organization of two banks, the second of which,
known as the Bank of Missouri, was organized February 1, 1817. Inflation
was the order of the day. The town took on airs of magnificence and
extravagance. Wealth accumulated so rapidly that some seemed at a loss to
spend it, and gave entertainments in which the tasteful and the barbaric
were strangely mingled. The United States held sales of public lands and
there were "rushes" such as we have seen in recent years in Oklahoma.
Building was undertaken in a lordly fashion and extravagant prices were
asked for everything. The demand for money was so great that recourse was
had to lotteries to raise funds for an academy at Potosi, to provide
fire-engines for the city, to erect a Masonic Hall. The lotteries soon got
into politics and were not dislodged until late in the seventies, after a
fight not unlike that waged for many years in Louisiana. It was in 1817
that the Legislature of Missouri established the public-school system and
incorporated the institution which persists to-day in the St. Louis Board
of Education, though it was many years before there was a public school in
the city. In the same year, in St. Louis, Thomas H. Benton, afterwards
United States Senator from Missouri for thirty years, leaped into notice,
engaged in a quarrel with Charles Lucas, United States Attorney for the
Territory of Missouri, and in a duel across the river, or rather on an
island in the river that has since become joined to the Illinois shore,
killed him. The place where the duel was fought became the rendezvous for
duellists and was called "Bloody Island." In 1817 the first Bible Society
in the Territory of Missouri was formed. The inflation of the day ended as
usual in collapse, but St. Louis and Missouri suffered less harm than other
sections.
When, in 1818, the Territory of Missouri applied for admission to the Union
the slavery question arose. There was a slight preponderance of sentiment
in favor of slavery, but very slight. The Missouri Compromise left its mark
on Missouri and St. Louis. The State was always regarded, however its
representatives stood, as doubtful on the slavery issue. From 1820 to the
breaking out of the Civil War it was always a compromise State and in that
war it was ever between two fires, furnishing soldiers in startling
abundance to each side and sympathizing with both. St. Louis suffered in
that long drawn out situation. A paralyzing incertitude was bred in the
city's mind, even toward progress. The people, especially the French, did
not take kindly to steamboats. "When Missouri was admitted to the Union,"
says Elihu Shepard, "there was no steamboat owned in the State and but one
steam mill." The assessed valuation of the town property was less than
$1,000,000 and the whole corporation tax less than $4000 per year while
Missouri remained a territory. The town contained six hundred houses, one
third of which were of stone or brick, the remainder wooden, one half of
which were framed. The population was estimated at five thousand, one
fourth of whom were French. The estimated annual value of the trade was
$600,000. Steamboats from the Ohio River took the carrying trade between
St. Louis and New Orleans, and the imports were estimated at $1,000,000.
All these conditions, while due in some measure to the extreme conservatism
and self-satisfaction of the dominant French element, were undoubtedly due
in larger measure to the hard times that prevailed when Missouri became a
State. St. Louis was incorporated as a city December 9, 1822. A spice of
adventure always entered into the then predominant business of the
community, for the fur companies fought with each other, and all of them
made common cause against the great Hudson Bay Company in the North, with
its headquarters in Canada. The people of that time thought little of
distances which even now seem great. Traders and trappers went without
hesitation through the wilderness to the very surf of the Pacific and the
people of the city never dreamed that what we now call Yellowstone Park was
very far away. Often enough the adventurous commercial traveller who left
St. Louis came back without his scalp or never came at all. The city was
picturesque. Men clad in buckskin and carrying rifles in their hands
elbowed representatives of first families attired in the fashion that came
from Paris, via New Orleans, or consorted with red Indians in paint and
feathers--and too often, too, in liquor. St. Louis and Missouri were "big"
in politics about that time. Missouri was for Clay, but Missouri's
representative did not vote for him and John Quincy Adams was chosen
President. After this Missouri became a Jackson State, and committed
herself to the South.
A patch of color in the drab details of the history of St. Louis for the
few years after the incorporation was the visit of Lafayette to the city on
April 29, 1825, and his sumptuous entertainment by the enthusiastic
inhabitants, most of whom, probably, loved the Frenchman more than the
friend of Washington. In June, 1825, the first Presbyterian church was
consecrated by Rev. Solomon Giddings, who "had a very respectable
congregation" for a city which was preponderantly French and Roman
Catholic. The French language was spoken in the homes of half the families
of the town. There were less than a dozen German families in a city which
now is more distinctly Teutonic than any other in the country, except
Milwaukee. The slavery issue was all the while growing, and in 1828 there
was formed at St. Louis a branch of the American Colonization Society, the
purpose of which was to further the settlement of free blacks in Liberia.
Many of the largest slave-owners in the city and State were members and
officers of the society. Between 1820 and 1831, a progressive movement
started. The new Court House was dedicated in 1829, and the work of opening
and paving streets was pushed with energy. The old French families resented
the new life and moved into the country. The pace was too fast for them.
The hunters, trappers, _voyageurs_ and bargemen began to disappear. The
city took on a truly American aspect, but the increase of population was
slow. Between 1820 and 1830, the population increased only 2000, but
between 1830 and 1840 the increase was nearly 10,000, reaching the total of
16,649.
Gradually Americanism made its impress. The wharf was lined with steamboats
and the levee with great stores. Steam ferryboats multiplied. The city
became a great river town, second in importance only to New Orleans. The
lead mines to the south of the city were productive. Manufactures of
various sorts sprang up. An insurance company was incorporated. Prosperity
was checked by fear of the great Black Hawk, who, at the head of the Sac
and Fox Indians, took the war-path in Illinois. Immigration and
transportation of goods to and from the North was checked till Black Hawk
was defeated and his tribe transported to the other side of the river,
where the influence of Great Britain could not reach them. No sooner,
however, had the city recovered from its slight panic than there came
another and graver excitement, another lull in business. Jackson's bank
veto was the cause. As if this were not enough to discourage the community,
along came the cholera, which in five weeks destroyed four per cent. of the
population. Cholera has reappeared since, from time to time, the most
serious visitation being in 1866, but the city as it grew began to pay
attention to the sewage question and in half a century had perfected such a
sewer system as is not surpassed in any city in the world. In 1835 the City
Council sold the town Commons, a tract of about two thousand acres, and
devoted nine tenths of the proceeds to street improvements and one tenth
to the public schools, and from this small beginning arose the system which
to-day directs the education of the children of a city of 575,000
inhabitants. In 1829 the St. Louis University, a Jesuit institution, was
founded, which has been since a centre of higher education for the sons of
the well-to-do Roman Catholics of the entire South and Southwest.
Considerably later was founded the institution now Washington University,
one of the best endowed educational establishments in the country, with a
manual training department famous the world over, and with its Mary
Institute for girls ranking with the best seminaries of the country. At an
early day the Roman Catholic religious sisterhoods of charity and
instruction established branches here. The Sisters of Charity founded a
hospital in 1832, aided by the liberality of John Mullanphy, which has been
in continuous service ever since. The Sisters of the Visitation came later
and established their convent for the higher education of girls and did for
the girls of the West and South what the St. Louis University did for the
boys. Still later came the establishment of medical colleges, one in
connection with the St. Louis University, and later the institutions
founded by McDowell and Pope, from which grew the swarm of large medical
and surgical colleges which now make St. Louis one of the most important
centres of medical education in the land.
[Illustration WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY AS PROJECTED, NOW UNDER CONSTRUCTION.]
Events moved rapidly after 1835. The growth of river traffic was steady.
The drift of emigration westward was beneficial to St. Louis in every way.
Men and money flowed in from the East and the South. There were rumors of
railroads, and, in April, 1835, a convention was held by representatives
of eleven of the most populous counties of the State to take steps to
induce the construction of railroads in the State and to and from the city.
The modern spirit manifested itself in every direction, and the year 1836
found the people regarding St. Louis as a metropolis, though in that year
occurred an incident demonstrating that the taint of barbarism lingered to
some extent among the people. A negro who had stabbed a constable was
seized by a mob and tied to a tree and burned to death, amid a chorus of
execrations,--an episode only too frequently duplicated in different
sections of the country of late years. At this time St. Louis had 15,000
inhabitants, but it was not till the year following that a theatre was
known. In the same year a brick fire-engine house was built, and leading
citizens were proud to be members of the company and "run with the
machine."
St. Louis was much interested in the Texan war of independence, and from
its stores supplies went to the followers of Houston, while many of the
younger men of the community left to join the Lone Star warriors in their
struggle. Later, when the war with Mexico began, there were multiplied
activities in the city, because the Government here outfitted many of its
troops. Here next were heard the first mutterings of the storm that broke
in 1861. Elijah P. Lovejoy, anti-slavery in sentiment, edited the _St.
Louis Observer_. On the night of July 21, 1836, persons unknown broke into
the publishing room and wrecked the establishment, scattering the type into
the street. No one was punished for the offence. Lovejoy went to Alton,
where later he was slain by fanatical opponents of his abolitionism, who
unwittingly wrote his name high on the list of the martyrs to freedom. St.
Louis had its first daily mail September 20, 1836, and on the same day the
_Missouri Republican_ commenced the publication of a regular daily edition.
In 1837 Daniel Webster was banqueted, and it was estimated that there were
more guests at the banquet than there were inhabitants of the city when
Lafayette was fêted twelve years before.
[Illustration ST. LOUIS IN 1854. FROM A PRINT IN MISSOURI HISTORICAL
SOCIETY COLLECTION.]
[Illustration FOREST PARK, ST. LOUIS.]