THE PANORAMA OF NORTHWESTERN DEVELOPMENT.
The forty-six years of Zachariah Chandler's life in Michigan saw a vast
material empire supplant an almost unbroken wilderness. His commercial
enterprise and success and his labors as a legislator were among the
influential agents in this marvelous development and give its story a
title to a place in his biography.
As early as 1634 Jesuits Brebuef, Daniel and Davost, following a route
explored by Samuel Champlain eighteen years before, passed up the
River Ottawa, across Lake Nipissing, down French river and along the
lonely shores of the great Georgian bay to the dark forests bordering
Lake Huron. Brebuef reached there first; Daniel came later, weary and
worn; Davost came last of all, half dead with famine and fatigue.[2]
Champlain had been before them, and other explorers preceded Champlain,
but these three were the first Europeans who made a habitation by the
shores of the great lakes which roll their tireless flood down through
the gateway of Detroit. They erected a hut, and daily rang a bell to
call the surrounding savages to prayers. Behind them was the tangled
forest they had penetrated; at their feet were the broad waters of
Lake Huron; beyond--toward the setting sun--was an abyss so soundless
that no echo had ever come from it. And these three soldiers of the
cross, converters of the heathen, unarmed and alone amid a multitude
of savages, were the advance ripples of the mighty wave that two
centuries later was to break across the lake at their feet and the
rivers below them and surge over the trackless wilderness beyond.
Seven years later (September, 1641,) Charles Raymbault and Isaac Jaques
embarked in a frail birch-bark canoe, paddling northwest from Georgian
bay among the countless islands of the St. Marie river, amid scenery
that filled them with delight. After seventeen days the Sault de St.
Marie burst upon their enraptured vision. There they were welcomed
"as brothers" by the Chippewas and there began the first known white
settlement in Michigan.
On the 28th of August, 1660, Rene Mesnard left Quebec, resolved to
make greater progress in the exploration of the Northwest. He ascended
the Sault in a canoe, coasted along the northern shore of the upper
peninsula of Michigan, and on the 15th of October of that year reached
the head of Keweenaw bay to which he gave the name of St. Theresa.
Eight years later (1668) a permanent mission was established at the
Sault. In the autumn of 1678 occurred an event forever memorable in the
annals of Michigan. There was then laid on the Niagara river the keel
of the first large vessel built on the shores of the great lakes. It
was completed and launched early in the following summer, and on the
7th of August, 1679 (200 years ago), amid the discharges of arquebuses
and the sound of swelling _Te Deums_ it began the first voyage ever
made by Europeans upon the upper inland seas of North America. This was
the "Griffin," sixty tons burden, carrying five guns, with La Salle
commander, Hennepin missionary and journalist, and a crew of Canadian
fur traders. Three days later (August 10), after many soundings, they
reached the islands grouped at the entrance of Detroit river. They
thus knew the lake was navigable by vessels of large size--this was
one step toward solving the destiny of the West. Ascending the river,
the explorers passed by a large number of Indian villages; these had
been visited years before by Jesuit missionaries and _coureurs des
bois_. Some fix the date as early as 1610, but others make it later,
no names being given in either case. Louis Hennepin gives the earliest
description of the river: "The strait (De troit) is finer than Niagara,
being one league broad, excepting that part which forms the lake that
we have called St. Clair." The strait once voyaged and understood, its
value was quickly appreciated by the French as a means of resisting the
inroads of the persevering English (who from New York and New England
were pressing upon their possessions in the East), and of preventing
British interference with the valuable hunting privileges or with
the Indian tribes dwelling upon the borders of the Northern lakes.
With this in view the Marquis de Nonville, Governor-General of the
Canadas, ordered (June 6, 1686) M. Du Lhut, who had been commandant at
Michilimackinac, "to establish a post on the Detroit, near Lake Erie,
with a garrison of fifty men," and the order added, "I desire you to
choose an advantageous place to secure the passage, which may protect
our savages who go to the chase, and serve them as an asylum against
their enemies and ours." In obedience to these instructions, M. Du Lhut
proceeded to the entrance of the strait from Lake Huron, where he built
a fort and established a trading post (on the site of the present Fort
Gratiot) which he called Fort St. Joseph. Thus (1686) was made the
first settlement by Europeans in the lower peninsula of Michigan.
The misfortunes of the war with England which terminated with the peace
of Ryswick (Sept. 1, 1697,) still further convinced the most sagacious
of the leading French colonists of the importance of a fort on the
Detroit river which would command this channel of communication with
the great lakes above. Impressed with this fact, Antoine de la Mothe
Cadillac, a Gascon sailor who amid a career of romantic adventure came
to be commandant at Michilimackinac, crossed the Atlantic in person,
and earnestly and repeatedly pressed upon the colonial minister, Count
Ponchartrain, the necessity of the prompt establishment of a permanent
post on the Detroit, where it would bring the French forces in closer
proximity to the Iroquois and would give them command of the waters
of the upper lakes and of the great fur trading regions about them.
Cadillac did not urge this as a missionary enterprise but for its
commercial and military advantages, and the force and vigor of his
representations prevailed at the palace. He sailed from France with the
royal order, "Take prompt possession of Detroit," with this supplement
from Ponchartrain: "Prosecute vigorously; if the Jesuits obstruct,
return and report." Cadillac arrived in Quebec early in the first year
of the eighteenth century (March 8). Three months later (June 5) his
preparations were made, and on that day he took his departure from La
Chine. With him were Captain Tonti, Lieutenants Dugue and Chacornacle,
fifty soldiers, and fifty Canadian traders and artisans. Nineteen days
later he arrived upon the site of the present city of Detroit. In his
memoir Cadillac wrote: "I arrived at Detroit, July 24 (1701), and
fortified myself there immediately. I had the necessary huts made and
cleared up the ground preparatory to its being sowed in the autumn."
When he touched the shore of Michigan, with pomp and ceremony he
erected a cross, a cedar post beside it; then with a sword in one hand
and a sod in the other he made solemn proclamation with many words of
"possession taken" of all the country round about, from the great lakes
to the south seas, in the name of the King of France.
Thus French Michigan began, and so it remained until Wolfe's victory
gave new rulers to Canada and to all the French possessions beyond.
On Nov. 29, 1760, the French flag floated for the last time over
Detroit, as a part of the dominion of France. On that day Maj. Robert
Rogers, an English provincial officer, native of New Hampshire, took
possession in the name of another king, ran up the Cross of St. George,
fired a salute, gave some round British cheers, and (the Treaty of
Paris confirming this occupation) Michigan was English. It so remained
until the Revolution and the treaty of 1783 made it American. But
it was not until thirteen years after (1796) that it was evacuated
by the British garrison; in June of that year Captain Porter with a
detachment of American troops entered the fort and hoisted the Union
flag for the first time, and took formal possession in the name of the
United States. The Hull surrender again swept Detroit and that part of
Michigan lying within its command under the Cross of St. George (Aug.
16, 1812,) to remain until Perry's victory and the subsequent military
successes of General Harrison expelled the English and restored it
permanently to the Union, on Sept. 28, 1813. During the Revolution
Detroit was the headquarters of British power in the Northwest, and
from it were sent out the expeditions which ravaged the frontiers of
Pennsylvania and Virginia.
The British captain, Rogers, who took possession in 1760, afterwards
reported the population (1765) as: Able-bodied men, 243; women, 164;
children, 294--total, 701. This was exclusive of the garrison, who
were sent away as prisoners of war, and included the 60 men, women and
children who were slaves. He also reported that of the French families
remaining in the settlement there were 23 men able to bear arms, 24
women, and 41 children. The others were probably English who had
followed upon the track of the troops. Captain Rogers's report gives
strength to this supposition. It says: "There are in the fort many
English merchants, several of whom have bought houses." Then it gives
this insight into the industrial condition of the settlement: "Of farms
there are 40, and some fourscore acres in depth with a frontage on
the river; of these several farms are at present in cultivation." The
number of acres under cultivation is given as 404; number of bushels
of wheat raised the preceding year, 670; bushels of corn, 1,884. The
report quaintly adds: "The Indian corn would have been in greater
abundance, had proper care been taken of it; the most part has been
devoured by birds."
Here remote from the world, with the joyous sparkling of the great
river at their feet, the luxuriance of the forest about them, the
cottages of the settlers peeping out from the green foliage in which
they were half hidden, these simple colonists lived uneventful lives,
surrounded by the beauty and the bounties of nature. The forests teemed
with game, the marshes with wild fowl, and the rivers with fish. The
long winters were seasons of enjoyment. In summer and autumn traders,
voyageurs, _coureurs des bois_, and half-breeds gathered from the
distant Northwest, and the settlement was boisterous with rude frolic
and gaiety. This was Detroit and Michigan in 1765.[3]
Between the French surrender and American occupancy, little was done
toward the development of the peninsulas. In 1796 there were a few
straggling settlements on the Detroit river, as also on Otter creek
and on the rivers Rouge, Pointe aux Tremble, and other small streams
flowing into Lake Erie. The French Canadians had extended their farms
to a considerable distance along the banks of the St. Clair. Detroit
was a small cluster of rude wooden houses, defended by a fort, and
surrounded by pickets. Villages of the Ottawas and Pottawatamies stood
on the present site of the city of Monroe, and near them were a few
primitive cabins constructed of logs, erected by the French on either
bank of the river Raisin; this was called Frenchtown, and is now part
of Monroe. On the upper lakes there were the posts on the island of
Mackinac, at St. Marie, and at St. Joseph (on the St. Joseph river).
The transition from France to England had given the monopoly of the
fur trade to the Hudson Bay Company, thus changing the direction of
its profits; otherwise the effect upon Michigan had been a change of
masters, flag and garrison, and little else. And the shifting from
England to the United States also meant only new faces and new colors
in the fort; otherwise it was for the time effectless.
The interior of the country was but little known except to those
engaged in the fur trade, and they were interested in depreciating
its value. Even as late as 1807 the Indian titles had only been
partially extinguished, and no portion of the public domain had been
brought into the market. The opposite shore was occupied by a vigilant
and jealous foreign power. The interior of the future State swarmed
with the savages who yet made it their home, and an Indian war was
threatening. These things repelled the tide of immigration that was
already surging over Ohio and the country bordering on the Ohio river.
Fourteen years after American possession the population of Michigan
was given as: Whites, 4,384; free blacks, 120; slaves, 24--total,
4,528. Five years before the number of householders in the lower
peninsula was officially given as 525. There are antecedent estimates
of population and assertions, but no facts that can be relied on. It
is, however, probable that at the time of the British evacuation (1796)
the population did not exceed 2,500 souls, for two years afterwards
(1798) Wayne county, then co-extensive with the present State of
Michigan, sent a representative to Chillicothe, where it was claimed
that the Northwest Territory was entitled to a delegate in Congress
because there were then 5,000 inhabitants within its boundaries. It can
scarcely be possible that half of that aggregate was in Michigan alone,
and that its settlers then equaled in numbers those scattered over
the inviting and fertile region which now includes the powerful and
populous States of Ohio, Indiana and Illinois.
The growth of the decade succeeding 1810 was trifling. In 1820 the
census showed but 9,048 souls in Michigan Territory, which included
the present State and the region beyond the lakes north of Illinois.
The war was over. Indian depredations had ceased and the Indian titles
had been quieted. The perils of settlement were removed. The seeming
obstacles of the toil and privations of frontier existence were mere
cobwebs in the way of the hardy and adventurous. But there yet remained
serious impediments to Michigan's growth. Distance was one, for the
State was still difficult of access, and canals and railroads were yet
in the future. A more serious impediment was a blunder. On May 6, 1812,
Congress passed an act requiring that 2,000,000 acres of land should
be surveyed in Michigan Territory. The surveyors went into the forest
with their chains and poles, and the result was a report to Congress
which may be thus summarized: "Many lakes of great extent; marshes
on their margins; marshes between; other places covered with coarse
high grass; this grass covered with water from six inches to three
feet; lakes and swamps over half the country; the intermediate space
poor, barren and sandy; the dry land composed of sand-hills, with deep
basins between and more water; the margins of many of the streams and
lakes literally afloat, or thinly covered with a sward of grass with
water and mud underneath; the country altogether so bad that there
would not be more than one acre out of a hundred, if there would be
one out of a thousand, that would in any case admit of cultivation."
Official stupidity had its effect on Congress, and in 1816 (April 29)
that body cancelled the survey order, and abandoned Michigan to the
hunters and trappers and their game. For two years this continued;
but the adventurous would plunge into the wilderness and would come
back and talk of beautiful valleys, broad prairies and fertile soils.
Explorations widened and a multitude of witnesses came with their facts
to prove that the curtain of forest concealed something more inviting
than marsh and barren and sand-hill. Then the government (1818) ordered
a new survey and out of all this came part of the truth, namely: There
was in this wilderness an immense variety of forest trees--oak, maple,
ash, elm, sycamore, locust, butternut, walnut, poplar, whitewood,
beech, hemlock, spruce, tamarack, chestnut, white, yellow, and Norway
pine. There were plains and natural parks; there were level prairies
and hills rising with gradual swell away to the center of the State.
Of soils there were deep sandy loams mixed with limestone pebbles,
deep vegetable moulds mingled with clay producing dense and luxuriant
vegetation, brown loams mingled with clay, deep vegetable moulds with a
surface covering of black sands. There was water in abundance, rivers
and streams and creeks and beautiful lakes. All these reports and more,
confirmed and re-confirmed by pioneers and surveyors, came back from
the interior, until the exceeding richness and great agricultural value
of the Lower Peninsula of Michigan was established.
But another event was to exercise a most important influence upon the
future State. In 1817 the first steamer upon the Northern lakes, the
"Ontario," was launched, and, amid bonfires, illuminations and most
lively demonstrations of joy, made her first trip upon Lake Ontario.
This heralded the dawn of a material revolution. One year later, on the
27th day of August, 1818, the "Walk-in-the-water," the first steamer
launched above Niagara Falls, came up to the wharves of Detroit after
a passage of forty-four hours from Buffalo. This vessel, of only 340
tons, and lost three years later, was a puny affair, but wise men
saw in her advent the promise of a future which time has more than
realized. Then in the wake of the steamer, Congress (1819) ordered
the public lands of Michigan placed in the market for sale. At this
time Detroit contained 250 houses, 1,415 inhabitants, and the entire
territory a population of 8,896. In 1825 the Erie canal was completed,
and its far-sighted projector, De Witt Clinton, sailed amid national
acclamations from Lake Erie to tide-water. It completed the link of
direct water communication with Michigan, and the stream of Western
emigration was quickly swollen to a torrent.
Mr. Chandler first came to Michigan in 1833. Three years before (1830)
the census of the entire territory, as it was constituted when Illinois
was admitted to the Union, was 32,531. The growth during the preceding
decade had been steady, not immense; that was to come after. It was
in the year of 1833 that the first settlement was made in the present
State of Iowa. And in that fall (September) the people of Detroit were
rejoicing that "arrangements were in train for the establishment of a
new stage-line route to Chicago, by which travelers can go from one
place to the other in five days." There was not then a mile of railroad
in the territory, and not until five years after (1838) was the first
twenty-nine miles completed to Ypsilanti. Detroit was still a frontier
post numbering less than 4,000 inhabitants. On all the Western lakes at
the beginning of that year there were but eighteen steamers, ranging
from fifty to 395 tons in burden, and aggregating but 3,710 tons, and
with the best of these a voyage of thirty-nine hours from Buffalo to
Detroit was a remarkable passage. All this was improvement; yet the
Detroit merchant in that year could not expect to receive his purchases
made in New York within less than from three to six months after the
time of setting out to procure them. During the winter steamboats and
river craft were ice-bound, and the settlements at Detroit, the River
Raisin and elsewhere throughout the broad peninsula, were shut out from
the Eastern world, except as travelers braved the tedious and painful
staging through Canada to Buffalo, with its week of continuous day and
night journeying.
A year later (1834) Congress defined the boundaries of Michigan
Territory. Let the finger trace on the atlas the northern borders
of Ohio and Indiana, follow around the south shore of Lake Michigan
to the boundary between Wisconsin and Illinois, pursue that line to
the Mississippi river, then down its stream to the north line of the
State of Missouri, along that westward to the Missouri, and up that
river until between the 25th and 26th degrees of west longitude the
finger reaches the faint line, coming down into the Missouri from the
north, of the White Earth river--all the land and lakes between the
Detroit straits and this little White Earth river and between the
line so traced and the British possessions, was Michigan Territory in
1834 and until Michigan was admitted as a State into the Union. It
was an imperial domain, larger than Sweden and Norway united; nearly
three times greater than England, Wales, Scotland, Ireland, and the
Channel islands; surpassing the united territories of France, Belgium,
Switzerland, Denmark and The Netherlands; even exceeding the combined
acreage of Italy and the German Empire. Yet in all this region, when
Mr. Chandler displayed his first stock of goods in Detroit, there
was not one mile of railroad or telegraph, not one steam mill or
manufactory, but one city approaching 4,000 inhabitants and not one
exceeding it, and not a single mile of paved street or sewerage. There
was but one water-works, and no gas-works. There was not one daily
newspaper, and but few of any kind. The valuable iron deposits of
the Upper Peninsula were undiscovered. The wealth of pine timber was
unknown. In the previous year (1832) the total value of foreign and
domestic produce exported from Michigan amounted to but the trifling
sum of $9,234, and in the preceding federal census (1830) the entire
civilized population of this vast area of limitless possibilities was
less than 33,000, although there were then in the Union twenty-four
States with a population of 12,866,020.
[Illustration: DETROIT TN 1834.]
Mr. Chandler came in with the first swell of the great tide of
emigration which broke over Michigan Territory. Up to within a brief
period preceding, that extensive and fertile region was scarcely known
except as it appeared on maps. Its rich prairies, its fertile plains,
its deep forests with all their wealth, were a _terra incognita_ to all
white men except the fur traders. But it was being rapidly known and
understood. Its fame had rolled back over the East, and the fruits were
seen in the new faces and sturdy forms swarming to Detroit as a point
of departure to the new and beautiful land. In that year (1833) it was
a matter of boasting that as many as "one hundred and seventy-five
emigrants had landed in Detroit in one day." The next year _Niles'
Register_ had a report from Detroit that the arrivals had reached the
magnificent proportions of "nine hundred and sixty in one day," and
that "the streets of Detroit were full of wagons loading and departing
for the West," principally for the region about Grand river. And the
same journal said: "The character of these emigrants is in every
respect a subject of felicitation. They will give Michigan a capital
stock of wealth and moral worth unequaled by any of the newly-formed
States, and scarcely approximated by Ohio."
In 1833 and for more than a year afterward the business part of Detroit
was confined to the narrow space bounded by Wayne and Randolph streets,
Jefferson avenue and the river, and at the same time there were but few
buildings on Jefferson avenue above Rivard, and but one on Woodward
avenue north of State street. Old wind-mills lined the shores; the
little unsightly French carts clattered through the streets; ducks,
geese and pigs were the only city scavengers. This sounds like another
age--another continent--but it was the Detroit and Michigan of but
forty-six years ago. Change came with population--slowly at first, then
with increased speed, then with immense strides. Mr. Chandler lived
to see it all and to be a part of it. He came with the early tide
of population; he saw the tide rising, at first languid, halting and
uncertain; he saw it year by year gathering momentum and volume until
it swelled and rolled over Michigan a mighty flood of brawn and brain,
of enterprise and conscience.
On the fifth day of November, 1879, tens of thousands of people looked
upon the dead face of the stalwart Senator and followed his body to
its last resting place in the city to which he had come in 1833.
Forty-six years and a few weeks had passed; no more. But in that time
the city which he made his home had spread its wings until it covered
an area of thirteen and a half square miles, with 300 miles of streets
(seventy-six miles paved), and some of them among the broadest and
most beautiful in the world, shaded by rows of graceful trees of
luxuriant foliage, and adorned by stores and private residences rich
in finish and architecture. It had 200 miles of water-mains and 150
miles of sewers, making it one of the most perfectly-drained cities
on the continent. Its population had grown to be 120,000, and its
taxable wealth to exceed $87,000,000. School buildings, representing
a public investment of $650,000 and accommodating 15,000 pupils, were
scattered through its wards, and numerous churches and abundant public
and private charitable institutions made proclamation of the faith and
philanthropy of its citizens. Great manufacturing enterprises lined its
wharves and suburbs; scores of railroad trains arrived at and departed
from its depots daily; and the commerce of the lakes was passing along
its river front at the rate of thousands of tons hourly.
But the change in Michigan had been no less marvelous. The State
has a representation in the present Congress of the United States
exceeding that of any one of eight of the first States of the
Union, equaling the representation of that of two others (Georgia
and Virginia), and only exceeded by that of three of the original
thirteen--Massachusetts, New York, and Pennsylvania. In a single
county of the Upper Peninsula, in 1833 supposed to be only a mass of
barren, uninviting and uninhabitable rocks, there are three cities
either one of which has a greater population than the Detroit of that
day, and in Michigan out of its forty-three cities and 178 villages
(April, 1879) there are over thirty more populous than Detroit in
1833--some of them with populations from five to eight times greater.
The people of the State are a million and a half in number, spread over
the greater part of the Lower Peninsula, about the Sault, and from
Marquette to Ontonagon and south to Menominee in the Upper Peninsula.
Its newspapers have grown to twenty-three dailies and over 300 with
less frequent issues. Its railroads have developed from non-existence
to 3,500 miles, owned by thirty-six corporations, connecting Detroit
and the principal cities of Michigan with all portions of the State,
penetrating to every center of population and industry, costing over
$160,000,000, and paying in each year for salaries and operating
expenses over $13,000,000. Strong institutions for the care of the
deaf and dumb and the blind and for the insane, a thriving college
for agricultural education, and that noblest monument of the wisdom
and forethought of the latter-day founders of Michigan, the State
University, were all planted in these years. And with this, the public
school system was nourished until there are over 300 graded schools and
over 6,000 public schools in the State, with property valued at over
$9,000,000, paying almost $2,000,000 yearly in teachers' wages, and
with annual resources amounting to nearly $4,000,000. In the mountains
of the Upper Peninsula, so long reputed a barren wilderness, have been
discovered exhaustless mines of the richest iron ores and the most
extensive and valuable copper deposits known on the globe. The Saginaw
Valley has poured a briny stream of wealth upon the State from its
unfailing salt-wells, and from the forests about and beyond to the
westernmost limits of Michigan have been gathered great treasures of
pine and hard woods. And while nature was yielding its hidden stores
to enrich the State its skilled citizens were not idle. Over 10,000
manufacturing establishments in Michigan now employ upward of 70,000
people, pay more than $25,000,000 annually in wages, make an infinite
variety of wares, and turn out products each year amounting in value
to more than $130,000,000. The statistics of agricultural development
are equally remarkable. The log cabin and the clearings have yielded
to ample farms. The marsh, the pine barren, even the hyperborean
soil of the Upper Peninsula, have been transformed into productive
wheat-fields. The cereals of Michigan exceed in their annual product
70,000,000 bushels, and $45,000,000 in their value. Highly cultivated
and valuable farms (over 111,000 in number and with a total acreage of
10,000,000) cover the greater part of the Lower Peninsula. Comfortable,
even stately, farm houses dot the landscape. School-houses, churches,
villages, towns and cities stand where the forest was. The wilderness
has fled away. Everywhere there are evidences of peace, prosperity,
happiness and a high civilization. It is magic; courage, intelligence
and industry have been the magicians.
The changes in the other parts of the Michigan Territory of 1833 have
been no less marvelous. Four States have been carved out of that
region whose boundaries in 1834 were traced on the atlas--Michigan,
Wisconsin, Iowa and Minnesota--and the great wheat farms of Dakota
will soon develop into a fifth. This entire territory to-day has eight
Senators, twenty-nine Representatives and one Delegate in Congress,
has over 11,000 miles of railroad, seventy-seven daily papers and over
1,100 weekly or monthly publications, and several great cities larger
than Philadelphia and New York when the United States had taken its
second census. It has a population greater than that of the thirteen
colonies which successfully defied the power of Great Britain during
the Revolution, greater than that of the six New England States in
the present day. It produces a larger amount of breadstuffs than the
whole Union yielded when Mr. Chandler first came to the territory, and
contains more wealth than did all the States fifty years ago.
This is a marvelous story of growth. Nothing in the Old World has
equaled it. Nothing the New has exceeded it. It has confounded
prophecy. It has outrun imagination. It is the achievement of a
stalwart race. It is the triumph of faith, of zeal, of courage. It
dazzles the men of to-day. And it will stand for centuries to excite
the admiration of the historian and the wonder of the future.
FOOTNOTES:
[2] Parkman's "Jesuits in North America."
[3] This is Parkman's picture in "The Conspiracy of Pontiac."