Election in 1847--Cemetery laid out--Election in 1848--
Completion of the Canal--Effect on Peru--Diversion of
Trade to La Salle--Establishment of the "Peru Telegraph"
--Erection of the first Grain Ware House--Great Freshet.
At an election held on the 5th April, 1847, Churchill Coffing, Wm.
Chumasero, Geo. W. Gilson, Joseph P. Turner and Daniel O. Sullivan were
elected Trustees. Whole number of votes 63. This Board elected Wm.
Chumasero, President; S. W. Raymond, Clerk; James Elliott, Street
Commissioner; H. S. Beebe, Treasurer; Geo. Low, Assessor; David Perry,
Collector; Joseph P. Turner, Fire Warden; and H. W. Baker, Clerk. Soon
after, Raymond resigned and E. S. Holbrook was elected in his place.
The Cemetery, one mile north of the town, was purchased and laid out by
this Board.
At an election held in April, 1848, Erasmus Winslow, P. M. Kilduff, I.
C. Day, John Morris and S. N. Maze were elected Trustees. Whole number
of votes 128. This Board elected Erasmus Winslow, President; David
Perry, Clerk; James Elliott, Collector; H. W. Baker, Street
Commissioner; F. S. Day, Treasurer; J. P. Thompson, Constable; and
Dennis Dunnavan, Fire Warden. Thompson was subsequently elected Street
Commissioner, in place of Baker who failed to qualify, and Fire Warden
in place of Dunnavan who was removed.
The completion of the Canal, in the Spring of this year, forms an era in
the history of the town, and indeed of the State. Its effect upon the
town, however, was not so marked and immediate as upon the sister town
of La Salle, which then, for the first time, attracted general public
attention, and became a formidable rival to her older sister. Upon the
latter its favorable effects were more apparent in the course of the two
or three following years, when the increased prosperity of the country
reacted upon it. The travel, which had always centered at Peru, was
mainly diverted to La Salle. Although the waters of the Canal and River
were united at Peru, it was soon found, that in consequence of the
Steamboat and Canal Boat Basin being at La Salle, the practical junction
was there. The forwarding business, after a long and ineffectual
struggle on the part of Peru to retain it, finally settled at that
point.
In October Holbrook and Underhill established a weekly paper, called the
"Peru Telegraph."
The first substantial Stone Ware House built in the town was erected
this year, directly upon the river bank, by T. D. Brewster, Esq.
The Spring of 1849 was remarkable for the greatest flood known since the
settlement of the country. There had been heavy rains in the month of
January which raised the river out of its banks, overflowing all the
bottoms. The weather changed to cold suddenly and froze the waters, in
many places from bluff to bluff, into a broad crystalline Lake. Such was
the case on the bottom above the town, which was covered with a sheet of
ice for nearly six miles, to Utica. This mass of intercepted water,
together with all the country drained by the head branches of the river,
was afterwards covered with a heavy mass of snow. About the first of
March the weather again suddenly became warm, and heavy rains set in,
which soon loosened the accumulations of snow and ice. Every creek and
run contributed a flood, and every ravine and slough a torrent to the
swelling river, which on the 9th of March was twenty-five feet, or more,
above low water. Its sudden rise loosened the heavy masses of ice spread
over the bottoms above, without breaking them up. One of these came
down, miles in extent, entirely filling the space between the bluffs,
and crushed everything in its course. Trees, indicating a growth of
centuries, were as reeds in its path, producing no check to its
resistless and majestic motion. The Ware House, heretofore mentioned as
being built by Mr. Brewster, then occupied by Brewster and Beebe, was
crushed like an egg shell. It was nearly filled with wheat, flour and
merchandise, a portion of which had been hastily removed, and a portion
was destroyed. The waters soon subsided and the river became very low
before the close of navigation in the fall. This was the greatest
freshet which has taken place since the settlement of the country by the
Whites, but the Indians related to the early settlers accounts of still
higher waters. They have asserted that the present site of Ottawa has
been submerged within the memory of those now living. Shabone, an Indian
well known in Northern Illinois, is reported to have said that he has
passed over it in a canoe. In 1844, the great freshet occurred in the
Mississippi, raising the waters in the lower part of the Ill. still
higher than they afterwards were in 1849. This was not the case with the
upper portion of the river. An idea is current in this part of the
country, that great freshets recur, continuing throughout the greater
portion of the summer, once in seven years. This notion is justified by
the recurrence of protracted freshets in 1830, 1837, 1844, 1851 and
1858. Mr. Meginness, in his "Otzinachson" or "History of the West Branch
of the Susquehanna," mentions that the same impression prevailed in that
region concerning freshets, only that theirs recurred once in fourteen
years.