ALEXANDER RAMSEY, the first territorial governor of Minnesota, was

born in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Sept. 8, 1815. His paternal

ancestors were Scotch-Irish. His mother was of German descent. His

parents were Thomas and Elisabeth (Kelker) Ramsey. His father was an

officer in the war of 1812, and died when the son was but ten years

old. Frederic Kelker, an uncle, assisted in the education of the son,

who in turn assisted as salesman in the store of his uncle. At the age

of eighteen he entered Lafayette College; at Easton, Pennsylvania;

attended college but a short time, when he commenced the study of law

with Hon. Hamilton Alricks, of Harrisburg, graduating afterward in the

law school at Carlisle, and commenced the practice of law in 1839. He

commenced his political life in 1840, the year of the Harrison

campaign, and was made secretary of the electoral college. In 1841 he

was appointed clerk of the Pennsylvania house of representatives. He

was in the lower house of Congress from 1843 to 1846, and was

renominated for a third term, but declined. In 1848 he was made

chairman of the Whig state central committee, and the following year

was appointed governor of the newly formed territory of Minnesota by

President Taylor. He entered upon his duties as governor in May, 1849.

The territorial government was organized in June, and the governor

issued his proclamation establishing three judicial districts, and

providing for the election of members of the first legislature. He

served as governor four years. In 1855 he was elected mayor of St.

Paul. In 1857 he was candidate for governor of the State, but was not

elected. He was elected to that office in 1859, and re-elected in

1861. In 1863, before the expiration of his second term, he was

elected to the United States senate, and re-elected in 1869. March 4,

1875, he accepted the position of secretary of war in the cabinet of

President Hayes, and for a time was acting secretary of the navy. In

1883 he was appointed chairman of the Utah commission under the

Edmunds bill.

In the various departments of public service to which he has been

called, Gov. Ramsey has acquitted himself well, displaying rare

qualities of statesmanship. He is remarkable for his caution, which

leads him sometimes almost into conservatism, but results have

generally proved the sagacity of his apparently tardy movements. He is

a master in the exercise of a wise caution in the conduct of public

affairs. He has, in fact, great political sagacity. He has made

several favorable treaties with the Indians, being empowered during

his term as governor to act also as superintendent of Indian affairs.

During his two terms as state governor, he rendered the country great

service by his prompt response to the calls for volunteers and his

decisive and unwavering support of the general government. He also

acted with great promptness and resolution in the suppression of the

Indian outbreak. As a senator he supported all measures for the

prosecution of the war for the preservation of the Union; advocated

the abolition of the franking privilege and assisted in procuring aid

for the building of the Northern Pacific railroad, favoring the

project of three trunk lines between the Mississippi and the Pacific

States and the general plan of aiding these roads by the donation of

alternate sections of public land, and was also active in promoting

the improvement of the Upper Mississippi and navigable tributaries.

In person Gov. Ramsey is a hale, hearty, and well preserved gentleman,

who is passing gracefully into what with many is the season of the

sere and yellow leaf. He is genial and pleasant in his manners, and

would impress the ordinary observer as one whose "lines have fallen in

pleasant places," and who is the happy possessor of a good digestion,

a serene temper and a clear conscience.

On Sept. 10, 1845, he was married to Anna Earl Jenks, daughter of Hon.

Michael H. Jenks, for many years judge of Bucks county, Pennsylvania,

a lady of rare accomplishments, and in every way fitted to shine in

the society into which she was introduced as the wife of a governor,

senator and cabinet officer. In private life she was not less noted

for her kindness of heart, amiability and christian virtues. This

estimable lady died in 1883, leaving a daughter, Marion, the wife of

Charles Elliott Furness, of Philadelphia.

MAJ. WM. H. FORBES was born on Montreal island, Canada, Nov. 3, 1815.

His father was a Scotchman by birth, and was a member of the Hudson

Bay Company as early as 1785. Maj. Forbes was educated at Montreal,

where he also served an apprenticeship at the hardware business, and

afterward became junior partner in the same establishment. At that

time Montreal was the chief depot of supplies for the Indian trade of

the Northwest, and the reports which continually came to him of that

romantic region, together with the sight of the Indians and voyageurs

returning with their furs, so excited his love of adventure that he

resigned his position as partner in the hardware business and accepted

a clerkship with the American Fur Company. John Jacob Astor was then

president. The conditions were that the clerk should speak and write

the French language, which Mr. Forbes could do with facility. Having

engaged as clerk, his outfit was conveyed in bark canoes from

Montreal, in charge of fifty men enlisted for a three years' cruise.

Their route lay by way of the lakes to La Pointe, on Lake Superior,

and up the Brule river, from which the canoes and baggage were carried

across to the waters of the St. Croix, and descended thence to the

Mississippi. From the Sault Ste. Marie to La Pointe they were

transported on one of the company's schooners. They arrived at Mendota

in 1837. Gen. Sibley was then in charge at Mendota. Mr. Forbes clerked

for him ten years, and in 1847 took charge of an establishment

belonging to the company (called the St. Paul Outfit), and became a

resident of St. Paul until his death, twenty-eight years later. Mr.

Forbes was a member from St. Paul of the first territorial council,

and served four terms. In March, 1853, he was appointed postmaster at

St. Paul by President Pierce, and held the office three years. In 1853

he also formed a business partnership with Norman W. Kittson for the

general supplying of the Indian trade. In 1858 Mr. Kittson retired

from the firm, but the business was continued by Maj. Forbes until

1862, when the Indian outbreak put an end to the trade. During the

campaign he served as a member of Gen. Sibley's staff, and acted as

provost marshal at the trial of the three hundred Indians condemned to

death. At the close of this campaign he was commissioned by President

Lincoln commissary of subsistence in the volunteer service with the

rank of captain. He was elected auditor of Ramsey county in 1863, and

served two years, though sometimes absent on military duty. In 1864 he

was ordered to the district of Northern Missouri as chief commissary,

remained two years and was breveted major. In 1871 he was appointed

Indian agent at Devil's Lake reservation, which position he held at

the time of his death, July 20, 1875.

Maj. Forbes was twice married; first in 1846, to Miss Agnes, daughter

of Alexander Faribault, by whom he had one daughter, the wife of Capt.

J. H. Patterson, United States Army; again in 1854, to Miss A. B.

Cory, of Cooperstown, New York, by whom he had four children, three of

whom are living.

HENRY M. RICE.--The family of Mr. Rice came originally from

Hertfordshire, England, to Sudbury, Massachusetts, in 1638. Members of

the family figured conspicuously in the struggle for American

independence. His parents were Edmund and Ellen Durkee Rice. His

grandfather Durkee was in the French war of 1755. Mr. Rice was born in

Waitsfield, Vermont, Nov. 29, 1816; attended common school three

months in the year and a private school and academy in Burlington. He

went to Detroit, Michigan Territory, in 1835; was engaged in making

the first survey of the Sault Ste. Marie canal, made by the state of

Michigan in 1837, and went to Fort Snelling in 1839. He was post

sutler in 1840, United States Army, Fort Atkinson, Iowa Territory, and

was connected with the old fur company for several years. He was

elected delegate to Congress in 1853 for Minnesota Territory and

re-elected in 1855. He was elected first United States senator for

Minnesota, in 1857, admitted to his seat May 11, 1858, and served

until March 3, 1863. In 1860 he was a member of the senate special

committee of thirteen on the condition of the country. During his term

in the senate he was a member of the following standing committees:

Indian affairs, post office and post roads, public lands, military,

finance. He was on the last four named committees at the expiration of

the term of March 3, 1863.

[Illustration: Henry M. Rice]

In 1865 he was nominated for governor but was defeated by Gen. W. R.

Marshall. In 1866 he was delegate to the Philadelphia Union

convention. He also served in the following various capacities: United

States commissioner in making several Indian treaties; as a member of

the board of regents of the University of Minnesota; as president of

the Minnesota State Historical Society; as president of the St. Paul

Board of Public Works; and as treasurer of Ramsey county, Minnesota.

He is the author of the law extending the right of pre-emption over

unsurveyed lands in Minnesota. He has obtained land grants for

numerous railroads in Minnesota, and, with the assistance of Senator

Douglas, framed the act authorizing Minnesota to form a state

constitution preparatory to admission, fixing boundary, etc.

As a public man Mr. Rice has pursued a policy at once independent and

outspoken, not hesitating to express his convictions on the great

national questions of the day, and to place himself upon a national

rather than a party platform. During the war he upheld the

administration in a vigorous prosecution of the war, as the speediest

and most honorable means of obtaining peace. His letter to the St.

Paul _Press_ of Nov. 1, 1864, contains sentiments that must commend

themselves to every true lover of his country. We quote a few

extracts:

"I believe Gen. McClellan and Mr. Lincoln both desire peace--both the

restoration of the Union. The one favors the return of the Southern

States with slavery; the other wishes these states to return without

that institution. I believe that the revolted citizens forfeited all

rights they had under the constitution when they turned traitors; that

the Emancipation Proclamation legally and rightfully set every slave

free. I am as much opposed to again legalizing that institution in the

South as I would be to its introduction in the Northern States."

* * * "I am in favor of the return of the Southern States, and think

the day is not far distant when the same flag will float over us all,

and when that happy day shall arrive, I hope that the rights we enjoy

will be freely accorded to them, and no more."

* * * "When the Southern States return I shall be in favor of their

voting population being equally represented with our own, and no

further."

* * * "I think that in the long future, when all other of Mr.

Lincoln's acts shall be forgotten, his Emancipation Proclamation will

adorn history's brightest page. I am opposed to slavery for the reason

that _I am in favor of the largest human liberty_, and I can not

understand why some of our fellow citizens who come here that they

might be free can deny freedom to others."

* * * "I think it illy becomes those who took up arms to defend their

homes, their country, yea, liberty! to make overtures to armed

rebellion. I believe that by a rigorous prosecution of the war peace

will soon come, our liberties will be secured forever, and that

prosperity will follow. Union with slavery will be only a temporary

cheat, and can not last. Dissolution will bring ruin, anarchy and an

endless effusion of blood and money."

He has been a liberal contributor to the various public enterprises of

the city, to churches, public institutions and private parties. He has

built warehouses, business blocks and hotels. The park in front of the

city hall was donated by him. His name is inseparably interwoven with

the history of St. Paul and the State. Rice county bears his name. He

was married to Matilda Whitall, of Richmond, Virginia, in 1849.

EDMUND RICE, brother of Hon. Henry M. Rice, was born in Waitsfield,

Vermont, Feb. 14, 1819. His father died in 1829. He received a

somewhat limited common school education and spent most of his early

life clerking. In 1838 he came to Kalamazoo, Michigan, where he read

law with Stuart & Miller, and was admitted to the bar in 1842, making

commendable progress in his profession. While a resident of Michigan

he was master in chancery, register of court of chancery and clerk of

the supreme court. In 1847 he enlisted in Company A, First Michigan

Volunteers, of which company he was made first lieutenant, and served

through the Mexican War until its close.

In July, 1849, he came to Minnesota Territory, locating in St. Paul,

where he became one of the firm of Rice, Hollinshead & Becker until

1855, when he embarked in railroad enterprises. In 1857 he was elected

president of the Minnesota & Pacific Railroad Company, and afterward

of its successors, the St. Paul & Pacific and the St. Paul & Chicago

Railroad companies. He has been long regarded as one of the most

energetic and competent railroad men in the State. Mr. Rice has

figured largely in the politics of the State, having served several

terms in the territorial and state legislatures. He was a

representative in the territorial legislature of 1851, a senator in

the state legislatures of 1864, 1865, 1873, 1874, and a representative

in the sessions of 1872, 1877 and 1878.

[Illustration: Edmund Rice]

In 1885 he was elected mayor of St. Paul, and in 1886 was chosen

representative in Congress. Mr. Rice is an uncompromising Democrat in

his politics, and is so recognized by his party, which he served as

chairman of the state central committee in the presidential campaign

of 1872, and elector at large in the campaign of 1876. He was married

in November, 1848, to Anna M. Acker, daughter of Hon. Henry Acker, of

Kalamazoo, Michigan. Of eleven children, the fruit of this union, all

are living but the second daughter, Jessie, who married Frank H.

Clark, of Philadelphia, in 1870, and died in October, 1874. The eldest

daughter, Ellen, is the wife of Henry A. Boardman, of St. Paul.

LOUIS ROBERT.--Capt. Louis Robert was a descendant of the French

settlers who occupied Kaskaskia and St. Louis when they were in the

territory of Louisiana, then a French province. He was born at

Carondelet, Missouri, Jan. 21, 1811, and his early life was spent in

that region and on the Upper Missouri river. In 1838 he went to

Prairie du Chien, and in the fall of 1843 visited St. Paul and removed

thither the ensuing year, identifying himself with the interests of

that growing young city.

To say the least, he was a remarkable character. He possessed all the

politeness and suavity of his nationality, was impulsive, warm

hearted, generous and yet, as a business man, far-seeing and

loquacious. His broken English added a peculiar charm and quaintness

to his conversation, and he will be long remembered for his odd

expressions and his keen but homely wit. He was generous in aiding any

worthy object, and, as a devoted Catholic, gave liberally to the

support of his church. He donated valuable property to church building

and gave the bells to the French Catholic church and the cathedral in

St. Paul. His private charities were also liberal.

In 1847 Capt. Robert was one of the original proprietors of St. Paul.

He took a prominent part in the Stillwater convention of 1848. In 1849

he was appointed commissioner on territorial buildings. In 1853 he

engaged in steamboating, and at different times owned as many as five

steamers. He was also largely engaged in the Indian trade until the

massacre of 1862. He died, after a painful illness, May 10, 1874,

leaving an estate valued at $400,000. He was married in 1839, at

Prairie du Chien, to Mary Turpin, who, with two daughters, survives

him.

AUGUSTE LOUIS LARPENTEUR, the son of Louis Auguste, and Malinda

(Simmons) Larpenteur, was born in Baltimore, Maryland, May 16, 1823.

His grandfather, Louis Benoist Larpenteur, left France about the time

of the banishment of Napoleon Bonaparte to St. Helena, determined not

to live under the rule of the Bourbons. Auguste L., the grandson, was

reared in the family of his grandfather, his mother having died while

he was an infant. At the age of eighteen years, with his uncle, Eugene

N. Larpenteur, he came to St. Louis. Two years later he came to St.

Paul as clerk for Wm. Hartshorn and Henry Jackson, Indian traders. The

firm of Hartshorn & Jackson gave place to Freeman, Larpenteur & Co.

Mr. Larpenteur has been continuously engaged in commercial pursuits

since his arrival in St. Paul in 1843. He has seen the city grow from

a hamlet of five cabins to its present metropolitan dimensions, and

has been from the first one of its most enterprising and reliable

citizens. He was married Dec. 7, 1845, to Mary Josephine Presley. They

have five sons and five daughters.

WILLIAM H. NOBLES.--William H., son of Rev. Lemuel Nobles, was born in

the state of New York in 1816. In his early life he learned the trade

of a machinist and became a skilled artisan. In 1841 he came to Marine

Mills, but soon removed to St. Croix Falls and assisted in putting up

the first mill there.

He lived successively at Osceola, at the mouth of Willow river, and at

Stillwater. He was part owner of the Osceola mills in 1846, and it is

claimed that he built the first frame house in Hudson. In 1848 he

removed from Stillwater to St. Paul, and opened the first

blacksmithing and wagon shop in that city. He made the first wagon in

the Territory. He was a member of the house, fifth territorial

legislature, in 1855, from Ramsey county. In 1853 he made an overland

trip to California, and discovered one of the best passes in the

mountains. 1857 he returned and surveyed a government wagon road

through that pass. As a recognition of his services the pass received

the name of "Noble's Pass," and a county in Minnesota was also named

after him. In 1857 he laid out a government road from St. Paul to the

Missouri river. In 1862 he entered the army and was appointed

lieutenant colonel of the Seventy-ninth New York Volunteers, better

known as the "Highlanders." While on duty in South Carolina, a

personal collision with another officer led to his resignation. He was

afterward cotton collector for the government, United States revenue

officer, and master of transportation at Mobile. His health failing

during his arduous service, he returned to St. Paul, and died at St.

Luke's Hospital, on Eighth street, aged sixty years.

Col. Nobles was a man of immense vitality and energy, with a strong

inventive genius, by which he himself failed to profit; restless, fond

of travel, a little hasty and irritable, but possessing many admirable

traits. Mr. Noble was married in Illinois, prior to his location in

Minnesota, to Miss Parker, who survives him. Mrs. Nobles resides with

her family in California.

SIMEON P. FOLSOM, a younger brother of the author of this book, was

born in Lower Canada, near Quebec, Dec. 27, 1819. His father was a

native of New Hampshire, and while he was yet young returned to that

state, removing subsequently to Maine. Mr. Folsom came West in 1839,

settled in Prairie du Chien, and not long after engaged as clerk to

Henry M. Rice at Fort Atkinson. In 1841 he returned to Prairie du

Chien and for two years acted as deputy sheriff, one year as surveyor

of public lands, and two years as surveyor of county lands. In 1846 he

volunteered as a soldier in the Mexican War, but the company was sent

instead to garrison Fort Crawford, where he remained one year. On July

25, 1847, he landed in St. Paul, and has been engaged most of the time

since in the surveying and real estate business. He was city surveyor

of St. Paul in 1854, member of the school board in 1858-59 and 60, and

served three years as a soldier in the Seventh Minnesota during the

Civil War. He has one son, Simeon Pearl, Jr., and one daughter, wife

of J. B. Pugsley.

JACOB W. BASS was born in Vermont in 1815; came West in 1840 and made

his home at Prairie du Chien, where he kept a hotel and ferry and

engaged in general business. While a resident of Prairie du Chien he

was married to Martha D., daughter of Rev. Alfred Brunson. In 1844 he

purchased an interest in the Chippewa Falls mills, but in 1847 sold

out, and removed to St. Paul, where he engaged in hotel keeping in a

building made of tamarack poles, on the site of the present Merchants

Hotel, and known as the St. Paul House. In July, 1849, he was

commissioned postmaster, as the successor of Henry Jackson, the first

postmaster in St. Paul. He held the office four years. He left the

hotel in 1852. He has since resided in St. Paul, where he has been

engaged at different times in the real estate and commission business

and at farming. He has two sons. The oldest, a graduate of West Point,

holds a commission in the United States Army; the youngest is in

business at St. Paul.

BENJAMIN W. BRUNSON, son of Rev. Alfred Brunson, of Prairie du Chien,

was born in Detroit, Michigan, May 6, 1823. He came with his parents

to Prairie du Chien in 1835. He purchased an interest in the Chippewa

Falls mills in 1844, and in 1847 came to St. Paul and assisted in

surveying the first town plat. He laid out what was known as

"Brunson's addition." He was a representative in the first and second

territorial legislatures. He served three years during the Civil War

as a member of Company K, Eighth Minnesota Infantry, first as a

private, then as an orderly sergeant, and later as second lieutenant.

He has followed surveying many years, and has held several responsible

positions. He was married at St. Paul and has two sons and one

daughter.

CHARLES D. AND ABRAM S. ELFELT.--The parents of the Elfelt brothers

came from San Domingo to the United States in 1801, on the

establishment of a negro republic on that island, and settled in

Pennsylvania, where Abram S. was born in 1827 and Charles D. in 1828.

In 1849 the brothers removed to St. Paul and established the first

exclusively dry goods store in Minnesota, their building standing near

the upper levee at the foot of Eagle street. They also built the hall

in which the first theatrical performances in St. Paul were held. This

was the building now standing on Third and Exchange streets, which was

erected in 1851. At that time it was the largest building in the city,

and many of the old residents remember the ceremonies attendant upon

the raising of the frame. The dramatic hall was in one of the upper

stories, being known as Mazourka Hall. The materials used in its

construction were brought from long distances, coming up the river by

boat, and the laborers employed on the building were paid five dollars

a day for their services. Into this building the Elfelt brothers

transferred their store, stocking it at first with both dry goods and

groceries, but afterward limiting their trade to dry goods

exclusively.

Mr. Abram Elfelt originated the first Board of Trade, in 1864, and

when that body was merged into the Chamber of Commerce became one of

its directors. The brothers were public spirited and enterprising, and

always took a great interest in the welfare of the city. Abram S.

Elfelt died in St. Paul in February, 1888.

D. A. J. BAKER was born in Farmington, Maine, in 1825; attended school

at New Hampton, New Hampshire; studied law and was admitted to the bar

in Kennebec county, Maine, in 1847; came to St. Paul in 1848, and in

1851 made his home in the locality now known as Merriam Park. It is on

record that Judge Baker taught one of the first public schools in the

territory of Minnesota. He, with others, pre-empted the land and

located what is now Superior City, Wisconsin, but sold his interests

in that city. He was appointed to a judgeship in Douglas county,

Wisconsin, in 1854, and served three years; was county superintendent

of schools in Ramsey county for twelve years, and was a member of the

Democratic wing of the constitutional convention in 1857. He has been

a dealer in real estate. He was married to Miss Cornelia C. Kneeland,

a sister of Mrs. Dr. T. T. Mann, and late widow of James M. Goodhue,

in 1853. Mrs. Baker died in 1875. Maj. Newson, in his "Pen Portraits,"

says of her: "She was an affectionate wife and a devoted mother, and

amid all the trials and vicissitudes incident to the ups and downs of

an old settler's career, she never murmured, never complained, never

fretted, never chided; always cheerful, always hopeful, casting

sunshine into the home and weaving about all those she loved golden

chains of unbroken affection."

B. F. HOYT.--Rev. B. F. Hoyt, a local minister of the Methodist

church, and a prominent pioneer of 1848, was born at Norwalk,

Connecticut, Jan. 8, 1800. He removed to New York State, and later to

Ohio, where he married and resided until 1834, when he removed to

Illinois, and in 1848 to St. Paul. He purchased the property bounded

now by Jackson, Broadway, Eighth and the bluff for three hundred

dollars. The following spring he laid it out as "Hoyt's addition." He

dealt largely in real estate and at various times held property, now

worth millions. He was instrumental in the erection of the Jackson

Street Methodist church, and aided in, the endowment of Hamline

University. He died Sept. 3, 1875.

JOHN FLETCHER WILLIAMS, secretary of the Minnesota State Historical

Society, is of Welsh descent, John Williams, a paternal ancestor of

the seventh remove, having come to this country from Glamorganshire,

Wales. He was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, Sept. 25, 1834. He was

educated at Woodward College and Ohio Wesleyan University, graduating

from the latter institution in 1852. He came to St. Paul in 1855 and

engaged in journalism and reporting for about twelve years, during

which time he acquired a thorough knowledge of city and state affairs

and an acquaintance with the pioneers of the State, which knowledge he

utilized in writing biographical and historical, sketches, his

principal work in this line being the "History of St. Paul," published

in 1876.

In 1867 he was elected secretary of the State Historical Society. Upon

him devolved the duty of arranging its volumes and collections and

editing its publications. Most of the memoirs, and historical sketches

are from his pen. He has gathered manuscripts and material for a

history of the State which will ultimately be of great value. He is

the honorary corresponding secretary of the Old Settlers Association,

not being eligible to active membership in that body, which requires a

residence dating back to 1850. Various diplomas have been conferred

upon him by the historical societies of other cities and states.

In 1871 he was appointed by President Grant a member of the United

States Centennial commission from Minnesota, and served as such to the

close of the International Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia in

1876.

JOHN HENRY MURPHY was the first medical practitioner in St. Anthony

Falls, he having made that city his home in 1849. Mr. Murphy was born

Jan. 22, 1826, at New Brunswick, New Jersey. His father, James Murphy,

a shipbuilder, was a native of Ireland; his mother, Sarah (Allen),

belonged to an old New Jersey family. His parents removed to Quincy,

Illinois, in 1834, where John Henry obtained a good high school

education. He studied medicine and graduated from the Rush Medical

College in Chicago in 1850, and returned to St. Anthony Falls, which

he had made his home the year before. In this place he lived and

practiced his profession till near the close of the war, when he

removed to St. Paul.

In the summer of 1861, when Dr. Stewart, surgeon of the First

Minnesota Infantry, was captured at Bull Run, Dr. Murphy took his

place and served for six months, and afterward as surgeon of the

Fourth and Eighth Minnesota Infantry. Dr. Murphy was a representative

in the territorial legislature of 1852, and a member of the

constitutional convention, Republican wing, in 1857. As a man and a

physician Dr. Murphy has an enviable reputation. He was married to

Mary A. Hoyt, of Fulton county, Illinois, June 28, 1848. They have

five children.

W. H. TINKER was born at Hartford, Connecticut, in 1813; was married

to Elisabeth Barnum, at Rockford, Illinois, in 1840; came to Prairie

du Chien in 1843, and to St. Paul in 1849. He engaged for awhile in

tailoring, then in selling groceries, then clerked for S. P. Folsom &

Co., and also in the recorder's and marshal's offices. At one time he

owned eight acres in the heart of St. Paul, for which he paid two

hundred and eighty-four dollars, which is now worth a quarter of a

million.

GEORGE P. JACOBS was born in Virginia in 1832; was educated at the

Virginia Military Institute; came to Pierce county, Wisconsin, and

engaged in lumbering, afterward in farming and lumbering. He has

resided in St. Paul since 1870.

LYMAN DAYTON was born Aug. 25, 1809, in Southington, Connecticut, and

was early thrown upon his own resources. He commenced as a clerk in a

store in Providence, Rhode Island, and by faithfulness and industry

became in time a wholesale dry goods merchant. His health failing, he

sought the West in 1849, and selected for his home a high bluff, to

which his name has been affixed, near the city of St. Paul. He

purchased over 5,000 acres of land in the vicinity. The bluff is now

covered with palatial residences, business, church and school

buildings.

Mr. Dayton lived much of his time at a village founded by himself at

the junction of Crow river with the Mississippi. The village bears his

name. He was one of the proprietors and first president of the Lake

Superior & Mississippi Railway Company, and gave much of his time and

means to promote its interests. He died in 1865, leaving a widow

(formerly Miss Maria Bates) and one son, Lyman C., a heavy dealer in

real estate.

HENRY L. MOSS.--Mr. Moss is of English descent. His ancestors came

over prior to the Revolution, in which later members of the family

took a prominent part in behalf of the colonies. He was born in

Augusta, New York, and graduated at Hamilton College, New York, in

1840; studied law, and was admitted to practice in 1842 at Sandusky,

Ohio, where he practiced until 1845, when he removed to Platteville,

Wisconsin, where he became an associate with Benj. C. Eastman until

1848, when he removed to Stillwater. He was the second lawyer in this

place. In 1850 he moved to St. Paul. He served as the first United

States district attorney for Minnesota Territory, holding the office

from 1849 until 1853. He was reappointed to this office under the

state government in 1862, and served four years. Mr. Moss is a worthy

member of the Presbyterian church. His moral character and natural

abilities have commended him for the positions he has so

satisfactorily filled. Mr. Moss was married to Amanda Hosford, Sept.

20, 1849.

WILLIAM RAINEY MARSHALL is of Scotch-Irish descent, and of good

fighting stock, both his grandfathers participating in the

Revolutionary struggle. His father, Joseph Marshall, was a native of

Bourbon county, Kentucky, and his mother, Abigail (Shaw) Marshall, was

born in Pennsylvania. William R. was born in Boone county, Missouri,

Oct. 17, 1825. He was educated in the schools of Quincy, Illinois, and

spent some of his early years mining and surveying amidst the lead

regions of Wisconsin. In September, 1847, he came to St. Croix Falls,

and made a land and timber claim near the Falls on the Wisconsin side

(now included in the Phillip Jewell farm). While at St. Croix Falls he

sold goods; dealt in lumber, was deputy receiver of the United States

land office, and took an active part in the boundary meetings. He was

elected representative in the Wisconsin assembly for the St. Croix

valley in 1848, but his seat was successfully contested by Joseph

Bowron on the ground of non-residence, he residing west of the line

marking the western limit of the new state of Wisconsin. During the

latter part of the year 1847 he had made a visit to St. Anthony Falls

and staked out a claim and cut logs for a cabin, but partially

abandoning the claim, he returned to St. Croix Falls. In 1849 he

returned to St. Anthony Falls and perfected his claim. In the same

year he was elected representative to the First Minnesota territorial

legislature. In 1851 he removed to St. Paul and engaged in mercantile

pursuits, becoming the pioneer iron merchant in that place. During

this year he was also engaged in surveying public lands. In 1855, with

other parties, he established a banking house, which did well till

overwhelmed by the financial tornado of 1857. He then engaged in dairy

farming and stock raising. In 1861 he purchased the St. Paul _Daily

Times_ and the _Minnesotian_ and merged them in the _Daily Press_. In

1862 he enlisted in the Seventh Minnesota Volunteer Infantry, and was

made lieutenant colonel of the regiment. On the promotion of Col.

Stephen Miller in 1863, he succeeded to the command of the regiment,

and remained connected with it to the close of the war, participating

in the battles of Tupelo and Nashville, and in the siege of Spanish

Fort. Gen. Marshall won for himself an enviable record as a soldier,

and was breveted brigadier general for meritorious services. In 1865

he was elected governor of Minnesota, and re-elected in 1867. On

vacating the gubernatorial chair he resumed banking, and was made vice

president of the Marine National Bank, and president of the Minnesota

Savings Bank.

[Illustration: Wm. R. Marshall]

In 1874 he was appointed a member of the board of railway

commissioners. In November, 1875, he was elected state railroad

commissioner, and re-elected in 1877. In politics he is Republican, in

his religious views he is a Swedenborgian, being one of the founders

of that society in St. Paul. He is a liberal supporter of religious

and benevolent enterprises, and a man universally esteemed for

sterling qualities of mind and heart. He was married to Miss Abbey

Langford, of Utica, New York, March 22, 1854. They have one son,

George Langford.

DAVID COOPER was born in Brooks Reserve, Frederic county, Maryland,

July 2, 1821. He enjoyed good educational advantages, first in the

common schools and later had as a tutor Rev. Brooks, a Methodist

clergyman, an accomplished gentleman and scholar, who gave him

thorough instruction in the sciences and classics. In 1839 he entered

Penn College, where he became a ready writer and pleasant speaker.

After leaving college he studied law with his brother, Senator Cooper,

and in 1845 was admitted to practice. He practiced in several

counties, showed rare ability, espoused with enthusiasm the politics

of the Whig party, and on the accession of Gen. Taylor to the

presidency, in 1849, was appointed by him first assistant judge of the

supreme court for the territory of Minnesota. He arrived in Minnesota

in June, 1849, and located in Stillwater; was assigned by Gov. Ramsey

to the Second Judicial district, and held his first court at Mendota.

He changed his residence to St. Paul in 1853, and, leaving the bench,

devoted himself to law practice in St. Paul. He was a Republican

candidate for Congress in 1858, at the first session of the state

legislature.

He left Minnesota for Nevada in 1864, then went to Salt Lake City,

where he died in a hospital in 1875. He was twice married but left no

children.

BUSHROD W. LOTT was born in Pemberton, New Jersey, in 1826. He was

educated at the St. Louis University, and studied law in Quincy,

Illinois, being admitted to practice in 1847. A year later he

accompanied Gen. Samuel Leech to St. Croix Falls, and was clerk during

the first land sales in that region, while Gen. Leech was receiver.

The same year he came to St. Paul, settling down to the legal

profession. He was a Democrat in politics, and held the office of

chief clerk of the house in the legislature of 1851, being elected in

1853 and re-elected in 1856 as a representative. In 1853 he was beaten

for the speakership by Dr. David Day, after balloting for twenty-two

days. About ten years after this he became president of the town

council for two years, and was city clerk for a year and a half.

President Lincoln appointed him consul to Tehuantepec, Mexico, in

1862, where he served until 1865. Mr. Lott was a charter member of the

St. Paul Lodge, I. O. O. F. He died of apoplexy in 1886.

W. F. DAVIDSON, better known as "Commodore" Davidson, was born in

Lawrence county, Ohio, Feb. 14, 1825. He was early associated with his

father in canal boating and river life and acquired a strong

predilection for the pursuit in which he afterward became

distinguished. His father was a Baptist preacher, and the influence of

his teachings was apparent in many acts of the son's later life. His

advantages for education were limited, as his chief training was on

board the boats on which he was employed. In 1854 he came to St. Paul.

Before coming West he was interested in boating on the Ohio river, and

was the owner of several steamers. His first work in Minnesota was on

the Minnesota river, but soon afterward he became president of a

company known as the La Crosse & Minnesota Packet Company. His

experience and superior ability placed him at the head of river

navigation, and for many years he had scarce a rival, earning by this

supremacy the familiar cognomen of "Commodore," first applied to him,

we believe, by John Fletcher Williams.

During ten years of his river life he resided in St. Louis. With the

increase of railroads and the brisk competition of later days, he

gradually withdrew from the river trade and interested himself in real

estate in St. Paul, buying largely and building many fine blocks.

Though never an aspirant for office, Commodore Davidson was public

spirited and interested greatly in public enterprises involving the

prosperity of St. Paul. He was married in Ohio in 1856, to a daughter

of Judge Benjamin Johnson. He died in St. Paul, May 26, 1887, leaving

a widow, one son and one daughter. Capt. Thomas L. Davidson is a

brother, and Jerry and Robert R. are half brothers. Col. J. Ham

Davidson, a cousin and a man of considerable oratorical ability, was

associated with him in business.

[Illustration: WM. H. FISHER.]

WILLIAM H. FISHER was born in New Jersey in 1844. He entered the

railway service of the Dubuque & Sioux City railroad as check clerk at

Dubuque, Iowa, in 1864, serving as such and in other positions of

responsibility until 1873, when he removed to St. Paul, Minnesota,

entering the service of the St. Paul & Pacific railroad as

superintendent. He built the Breckenridge extension in 1877, and was

influential in relieving the St. Paul & Pacific railroad and branches

from financial embarrassment, which resulted in the organization of

the present St. Paul, Minneapolis & Manitoba system. In June, 1884, he

was elected general superintendent, and in June, 1885, president and

general superintendent, of the St. Paul & Duluth Railroad Company,

which position he at present worthily fills.

CHARLES H. OAKES, the son of a Vermont merchant and manufacturer,

David Oakes, at one time sheriff of Windham county, and judge of St.

Clair county, Michigan, was born in the town of Rockingham, Windham

county, July 17, 1803. He received a common school education, and at

twelve years of age went into a store and clerked until eighteen, when

he came to Chicago as clerk for an army sutler. In 1824 he commenced

trading with the Indians on the south shore of Lake Superior. In 1827

he entered the service of the American Fur Company, in whose employ he

remained until 1850, his headquarters being most of the time at La

Pointe. In 1850 he located in St. Paul. In 1853 he entered the banking

firm of Borup & Oakes, the first banking firm in St. Paul, since which

time he has lived a quiet and retired life, that contrasts strongly

with the strange and adventurous life he led as an Indian trader. Mr.

Oakes' only public life was during the Indian outbreak, when he

accepted a position as colonel on the staff of Gen. Sibley. He was a

member of the Protestant Episcopal church. By his first wife Mr. Oakes

had four children, two of them daughters, now living. Sophia is the

widow of the late Jeremiah Russell, and Eliza is the wife of Col.

George W. Sweet, of Minneapolis. A son, Lieut. David Oakes, was in the

Civil War, and was killed in battle. The other child died in infancy.

Mr. Oakes was married to his second wife, Julia Beaulieu, of Sault

Ste. Marie, July 29, 1831. She has had five children, but one of them

now living, Julia Jane, widow of the late Gen. Isaac Van Etten. One of

her sons, George Henry, was in the Civil War, and died two years after

of disease contracted in the service.

CHARLES WILLIAM WULFF BORUP was born in Copenhagen, Denmark, Dec. 20,

1806. He received a thorough classical and medical education. In 1828

he emigrated to America, and, having abandoned his original intention

of becoming a physician, entered into business, at first in the employ

of John Jacob Astor. He became chief agent of the fur company on Lake

Superior, with residence at La Pointe. In 1848 he removed to St. Paul

and entered into a partnership with Pierre Chouteau. In 1854 the

banking house of Borup & Oakes, of which he was senior partner, was

established. Dr. Borup died of heart disease, July 6, 1859, but the

banking business was continued under the firm name many years later.

He was married July 17, 1832, to Elizabeth Beaulieu, a daughter of

Basil Beaulieu, a French trader of Mackinaw. His widow died in St.

Paul several years ago. Of a family of eleven children, nine survive.

CAPT. RUSSELL BLAKELEY, one of the best known of the early steamboat

men, was born in North Adams, Massachusetts, April 19, 1815. He spent

a part of his early life in Genesee county, New York, where he

received a common school education; emigrated to Peoria, Illinois, in

1836, where he engaged in the real estate business; in 1839 he removed

to Galena, where he engaged in mining and smelting; in 1844 to

Southwest Virginia, returning to Galena in 1847, where he became one

of a steamboat transportation company. He was clerk upon the first

boat on the line, the Argo. This boat sank and he was transferred to

the Dr. Franklin, of which he became captain. He was captain of the

Nominee in 1853, and of the Galena in 1854. This last named boat was

burned at Red Wing, July 1, 1858. In 1855 he was appointed agent at

Dunleith of the Packet Company, and soon afterward bought a leading

interest in the Northwestern Express Company. The next year he removed

to St. Paul. In 1867 he retired from the company. Of late years he has

interested himself in railroad enterprises, and has contributed

greatly to the prosperity of the city and State.

RENSSELAER R. NELSON, United States district judge since Minnesota

became a state, was born in Cooperstown, Otsego county, New York, May

12, 1826. His paternal great-grandfather came from Ireland in 1764.

His grandfather was born in Ireland, but came to this country in his

childhood. His father, Samuel Nelson, was associate justice of the

United States supreme court. His father served as a soldier in the war

of 1812, and the son located the land warrant given for his services

in Minnesota. The mother of Rensselaer was Catharine Ann (Russell), a

descendant of Rev. John Russell, of Hadley, Massachusetts, in whose

house the regicides Goffe and Whalley were concealed for years, and

where they finally died.

Rensselaer R. Nelson graduated at Yale in 1846. In 1849 he was

admitted to practice law. He came to St. Paul in 1850. In 1857

President Buchanan appointed him territorial judge, and in 1858,

United States district judge, which office he still holds. He was

married to Mrs. Emma F. Wright, a daughter of Washington Beebe, of New

York State, Nov. 3, 1858.

GEORGE LOOMIS BECKER was born Feb. 14, 1829, in Locke, Cayuga county,

New York. His father, Hiram Becker, was a descendant of the early

Dutch settlers of the Mohawk valley. In 1841 his father removed to Ann

Arbor, Michigan, where the son entered the State University as a

freshman, and graduated in 1846. He studied law with George Sedgewick

until 1849, when he emigrated to St. Paul, arriving late in October.

Here he commenced the practice of law, being associated with Edmund

Rice and E. J. Whitall. Subsequently, on the withdrawal of Mr.

Whitall, Wm. Hollinshead became a member of the firm. The partnership

continued until 1856, when Mr. Becker withdrew to engage in other

pursuits, since which time he has been engaged in forwarding the

railroad interests of the State and serving in various positions of

honor and trust. He served as a member of the constitutional

convention in 1857. In 1862 he was chosen land commissioner of the St.

Paul & Pacific railroad, and in 1864 was elected president of that

corporation. In 1872 he was the unsuccessful candidate of his party

for Congress.

He is a member of the Old Settlers Association, of which he was

president in 1873, and of the Minnesota Historical Society, over which

he presided as president in 1874. He was one of the original members

of the Presbyterian church in St. Paul in 1850. He has served in the

council of St. Paul, and as mayor. He has figured most creditably in

the business, political, social and religious life of his adopted

city, and is an admirable type of a public spirited citizen. Since

1885 he has served as railroad commissioner. In 1885, at Keesville,

New York, he was married to Susannah M. Ismon, an estimable lady, who

has made his home attractive. Their family consists of four sons.

AARON GOODRICH.--Hon. Aaron Goodrich, first chief justice of the

supreme court of Minnesota Territory, was born in Sempronius, Cayuga

county, New York, July 6, 1807. His parents were Levi H. and Eunice

(Spinner) Goodrich. He traces his ancestry back through the

Connecticut branch of the Goodrich family to a period in English

history prior to the advent of William the Conqueror. His mother was a

sister of Dr. John Skinner, who married a daughter of Roger Sherman.

In 1815 his father removed to Western New York, where the son was

raised on a farm and educated chiefly by his father, who was a fine

scholar and teacher. He then studied law and commenced practice in

Stewart county, Tennessee. In 1847 to 1848 he was a member of the

Tennessee legislature.

In 1849 he was appointed to the supreme bench of Minnesota Territory.

He filled the position for three years. In 1858, at the state

organization, he was appointed a member of a commission to revise the

laws and prepare a system of pleading for state courts. In 1860 he was

made chairman of a similar commission. In March, 1861, President

Lincoln appointed him secretary of the legation at Brussels, where he

served eight years. While abroad, by his habits of study and

opportunities for research, he laid the foundation of his critical and

somewhat sensational work, "A History of the Character and

Achievements of the So-called Christopher Columbus."

In politics Judge Goodrich was originally a Whig, and was a

presidential elector in 1848. He was next a Republican, and served as

delegate to the convention of 1860. In 1872 he was a delegate to the

Liberal Republican convention which nominated Horace Greeley for

president. In later years he voted with the Democratic party.

Mr. Goodrich was Deputy Past Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of

Freemasons in the State, was one of the corporate members of the State

Historical Society and of the Old Settlers Association, of which he

was for many years the secretary. In 1870 he was married to Miss Alice

Paris, of Bogota, New Grenada, a descendant of the old Castilian

family de Paris, an accomplished lady, who, with a daughter, survives

him. Judge Goodrich died in St. Paul in 1886.

NATHAN MYRICK was born in Westford, Essex county, New York, July 7,

1822. He came to La Crosse, Wisconsin, in 1840. The writer first met

him at Prairie du Chien in 1841. He was one of the principal founders

of the city of La Crosse, managing a trading house in company with

Scoots Miller. He also engaged in lumbering on Black river. He came to

St. Paul in 1848, and has since made that city his home. He has been

an enterprising and successful trader with the Indians, principally

with the Sioux. Much of his trading stock was destroyed by the Sioux

Indians in the insurrection of 1862, but he has been recompensed in

part by the government. In 1843 he was married to Rebecca Ismon. They

have three children.

JOHN MELVIN GILMAN, son of John and Ruth (Curtis) Gilman, was born in

Calais, Vermont, Sept. 7, 1824. His father died in 1825. The son

received a good common school and academic education, graduating from

the Montpelier Academy in 1843. He read law with Heaton & Reed, of

Montpelier, and was admitted to the bar in 1844. During the same year

he removed to New Lisbon, Ohio, where he practiced law eleven years

and served one term (1849-50) in the state legislature.

In 1857 Mr. Gilman came to St. Paul, and formed a partnership with

Hon. James Smith, Jr., and later became one of the firm of Gilman,

Clough & Lane. Mr. Gilman served four terms as a representative in the

state legislature. His affiliations have been with the Democratic

party, for which he has been twice a candidate for Congress and

chairman of the state central committee. He was married to Miss Anna

Cornwall, of New Lisbon, Ohio, June 25, 1857.

CHARLES EUGENE FLANDRAU, son of Thomas Hunt and Elisabeth (Macomb)

Flandrau, was born July 15, 1828, in New York City. On his father's

side he is descended from Huguenots driven into exile by the

revocation of the edict of Nantes; on his mother's side from the

Macombs of Ireland. One of his uncles was Gen. Alexander Macomb,

commander-in-chief of the United States Army immediately preceding

Gen. Winfield Scott. He was educated until thirteen years of age in

the private schools at Georgetown and Washington, after which he spent

about three years before the mast; was at New York City about three

years, when he went to Whitesboro, Oneida county, New York, where he

read law and afterward entered into partnership with his father, being

admitted to practice in 1851. In 1853 he came to St. Paul with Horace

R. Bigelow and commenced practice in the firm of Bigelow & Flandrau.

In 1854 he removed to St. Peter and practiced law for several years.

This year (1854) he was appointed a notary public by Gen. Gorman.

[Illustration: Truly yours, John B. Sanborn.]

In 1855 he was elected a member of the territorial council, and in

1856 was appointed by President Pierce United States agent for the

Sioux Indians. In 1857 he served as a member of the Democratic wing of

the constitutional convention, and in July of the same year was

appointed by President Buchanan associate justice of the supreme court

of Minnesota Territory. He was elected to the same office, on the

admission of Minnesota as a state, for a term of seven years. During

Gov. Sibley's administration, he acted as judge advocate general of

the State.

Judge Flandrau took an active part in suppressing the Sioux outbreak,

serving as captain, and later as a colonel, of volunteers. In 1864

Judge Flandrau resigned his place on the supreme bench and went to

Nevada Territory for a year; spent some time in Kentucky and St.

Louis, Missouri, and returned to Minnesota in 1867, locating at

Minneapolis, where he opened a law office with Judge Isaac Atwater. He

was elected city attorney and was president of the first Board of

Trade.

In 1870 he removed to St. Paul and engaged in law practice with

Bigelow & Clark.

In 1867 Judge Flandrau was the Democratic nominee for governor of the

State, and in 1869 for the position of chief justice. In 1868 he was

chairman of the state central committee, and a member of the national

convention that nominated Horatio Seymour for the presidency of the

United States.

Judge Flandrau was married Aug. 14, 1859, to Isabella Dinsmore, of

Kentucky, deceased in 1866. His second wife was Mrs. Rebecca B.

Riddle, of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Feb. 28, 1871. His family

consists of two daughters by his first wife and two sons by his

second.

GEN. JOHN B. SANBORN was born Dec. 5, 1826, in Merrimac county, New

Hampshire, on the farm which had been in the possession of his

ancestors for four generations. After a common school education he

entered the law office of Judge Fowler, of Concord, New Hampshire,

where he remained for three years, when he was admitted to practice by

the superior court of New Hampshire, in 1854. In the following

December he came to Minnesota, where he has remained, a citizen of St.

Paul, and in the practice of his profession, except what time he has

been absent in the public service.

His public career began in 1859-60, in the house of representatives.

The following year he was sent to the senate, and that had adjourned

but a little over a month when he was appointed adjutant general and

acting quartermaster general of the State, and entered upon the

arduous duties of organizing the first regiment of volunteers in the

State for the war of the Rebellion.

In the following December he was commissioned colonel of the Fourth

Minnesota, and, with headquarters at Fort Snelling, garrisoned all the

posts and commanded all the troops along the Minnesota frontier during

the winter. Early in the spring of 1862 he left with his entire

command for Pittsburgh Landing, and was assigned to the command of a

demi-brigade, which he commanded till the evacuation of those works,

and was thereupon assigned to the command of the First Brigade,

Seventh Division, Army of the Mississippi, afterward the Seventeenth

Army Corps.

On the nineteenth of September following, with this brigade he fought

the battle of Iuka and won the victory for which he was promoted by

the president to brigadier general of Volunteers.

He participated in the battles of Port Gibson, Raymond, Jackson,

Champion Hills, and the assault on Vicksburg--a portion of which time

he was in command of a division. After the surrender of Vicksburg he

was assigned to the command of the Southwest District of Missouri,

where, after the campaign against Price, he was promoted to brevet

major general.

After the close of the war, by a few months' campaign on the Upper

Arkansas and along the Smoky Hill river, he opened to travel the long

lines across the plains to Colorado and New Mexico, which had been

closed for nearly two years, and restored peace to that frontier. Upon

a mission to the Indian Territory, to establish the relations which

should exist between the slaves of the Indians and their former

masters, he solved the questions and determined the relations, and

established them upon a firm foundation in the short space of ninety

days.

In 1866 he was appointed, with Gens. Sherman, Harney, Terry, and

Senator Henderson, a special peace commissioner to the Indians, and

for eighteen months served upon that board. This commission visited

and made treaties with the Camanche, Cheyenne, Arrapahoe, Apache,

Navajo, Shoshone, Northern Cheyenne, Northern Arrapahoe, and Crow

tribes; and with the Ogalalla, Brule, Minneconjon, Sausauche, Black

Feet, Umkapapa, Santee, and Yankton bands of the Sioux nation. They

settled upon and recommended to Congress a fixed policy to be pursued

toward the Indians, which, while followed, resulted in comparative

safety to the frontier, and greater economy in the service. Since

these services the general has devoted himself entirely to his

profession, and with more than ordinary success.

JOHN R. IRVINE was born in Dansville, Livingston county, New York,

Nov. 3, 1812, and was brought up there till seventeen years of age.

His education when a boy was obtained at the common schools, and was

quite limited. From seventeen to twenty years of age he lived in

Carlisle and other places in Pennsylvania, during which he learned the

trade of plastering, and was married in Carlisle in 1831, to Miss

Nancy Galbreath. Soon after his marriage he returned to Dansville. The

following spring he went to Buffalo, New York; in the spring of 1837

emigrated to Green Bay, Wisconsin, and in the spring of 1840 removed

to Prairie du Chien.

While in Prairie du Chien Mr. Irvine kept a grocery. During that time

he made two trips to St. Paul--the last one with a team loaded with

provisions, on the ice the most of the way--and on the third of

August, 1843, arrived in St. Paul with his family. On his arrival he

bought of Joseph Rondeau a claim of 240 acres of land, afterward

converted into Rice & Irvine's addition, Irvine's enlargement and

Irvine's addition to the city of St. Paul, including most of the

present city from St. Peter street to Leech's addition, for about

$300. Mr. Irvine entered it in 1848. The east 80 acres of a quarter

included in this claim Mr. Irvine sold to Henry M. Rice in 1848, and

in the winter they laid off Rice & Irvine's addition, and commenced

selling lots and making improvements on the property.

Since living in St. Paul Mr. Irvine has been engaged in farming,

milling, storekeeping, working at his trade, and managing his estate.

He was one of the earliest settlers of St. Paul, whose life amidst its

many changes has been contemporaneous with its history from the very

beginning. Mr. Irvine has had eight children, seven of whom, namely,

six daughters and one son, are living. Mr. Irvine died in 1878.

HORACE RANSOM BIGELOW was born in Watervliet, New York, March 13,

1820. His father, Otis Bigelow, was a Revolutionary patriot and

soldier. He received a good education at the schools of Sangerfield

and the gymnasium at Utica. He spent part of his early life in farming

and teaching. Later he studied law and was admitted to practice in

1847, in Utica, where he entered into partnership with E. S. Brayton

until 1853, when he removed to St. Paul, Minnesota, in company with

Charles E. Flandrau. He has since devoted himself almost exclusively

to his law practice, which includes almost every branch except

criminal law. In June, 1862, he was married to Cornelia Sherrill, of

Hartford, New York. They have four children.

CUSHMAN K. DAVIS.--In the quaint little Quaker village of Henderson,

New York, in a small house built partly of logs, and mossy and

venerable with age, on June 16, 1838, Cushman Kellogg Davis, late

governor and present senator from Minnesota, was born. His father,

Horatio N. Davis, removed to Wisconsin in August or September of the

same year, and settled on the present site of Waukesha. His father was

quite prominent; had served during the Civil War, and retired from the

service with the brevet rank of major; had held various municipal

offices, and had been a member of the Wisconsin senate. Cushman, his

oldest son, received as good an education as the times afforded, at

the common schools, at Carroll College, a Waukesha institution, and at

Ann Arbor, Michigan, where he graduated in 1857. He read law with Gov.

Randall, was admitted to the bar in 1859, and practiced at Waukesha

until 1862, when he enlisted in the Twenty-eighth Wisconsin Infantry,

going in as first lieutenant of Company B, but was adjutant general

under Gen. Gorman most of the time. At the end of two years, with

broken health, he resigned his commission and settled in St. Paul in

partnership with Gen. Gorman. In 1867 he was elected a representative

in the state legislature, and served one term. He was United States

district attorney from 1868 until 1873, when he was elected governor.

He served two years, and was the youngest man who has been elected to

that office. After leaving the governor's chair he resumed his law

practice until the senatorial election of 1887, when he was chosen to

succeed Senator McMillan in the United States Senate.

Senator Davis has devoted some time to general literature. His lecture

on "Feudalism" was delivered in 1870, and this lecture probably

secured him the nomination for governor in 1873. He has also lectured

on "Hamlet" and "Madam Roland," and in 1884 delivered a lecture before

the Army of the Tennessee and in 1886 a lecture to the graduating

class at Michigan University. He also published a book entitled "The

Law in Shakespeare," which attracted considerable attention. He was

married to Miss Anna M. Agnew, of St. Paul, in 1880.

S. J. R. MCMILLAN was born in Fayette county, Pennsylvania, in 1826.

He spent part of his early days in Pittsburgh; received a collegiate

education; studied law; was admitted to practice in 1849, and came to

Stillwater in 1852, where he established a law office. In 1858 he was

elected judge of the First district and served until 1864, when he was

appointed to the supreme bench. He was elected to the position in the

fall of the same year and served until 1875, when he was elected to

the United States senate. He was re-elected in 1881, and was succeeded

in 1887 by Cushman K. Davis. He removed to St. Paul in 1865.

Senator McMillan has had an honorable career and is greatly respected

as an upright, conscientious, active and thoroughly practical man. He

was married at Pittsburgh in 1852, to Harriet E. Butler. They have

three sons and three daughters.

WILLIS ARNOLD GORMAN, second territorial governor of Minnesota, was

born in Fleming county, Kentucky, Jan. 12, 1816. He received a good

literary education, and his parents having moved to Bloomington,

Indiana, he graduated at the law school connected with the State

University at that place. He commenced practice at Bloomington and was

quite popular as a lawyer, but even more so as a party leader, and was

elected to the legislature six times in succession. At the breaking

out of the Mexican War, in 1846, he enlisted as a private in the Third

Indiana Volunteers, but was appointed major. He won the reputation of

a gallant, dashing officer, and was promoted to be colonel of the

Fourth Indiana, which he helped recruit. He served till the close of

the war. On his return to Indiana, in 1848, he was elected to

Congress, and re-elected in 1850. In May, 1853, he was appointed by

President Pierce governor of Minnesota Territory. In 1857, at the

close of his term of office as governor, he was elected a member of

the constitutional convention, and was also an unsuccessful candidate

for the United States senatorship. In the spring of 1861, at the

breaking out of the Civil War, he was appointed colonel of the First

Minnesota Infantry. For bravery at the first battle of Bull Run he was

commissioned brigadier general. He was mustered out in 1864. Returning

to Minnesota he formed a law partnership with Cushman K. Davis. In

1869 he was elected city attorney and held that office till his death,

which occurred at St. Paul, May 20, 1876. He was twice married, first

to Miss Martha Stone, of Bloomington, Indiana, in 1836. She died in

March, 1864, leaving five children. In April, 1865, he was married to

Miss Emily Newington, of St. Paul.

JOHN D. LUDDEN was born in Massachusetts, April 5, 1819; was educated

at Williston Seminary, and came West to the lead mines of Wisconsin in

1842. In 1845 he came to St. Croix Falls, Wisconsin, remained at this

point and at Taylor's Falls until 1849, when he made his residence at

Marine Mills, Minnesota. In 1857 he changed his residence to

Stillwater, and in 1861 became a citizen of St. Paul, where he still

resides. He was a member of the second, third and fourth territorial

legislatures. From 1854 to the present time he has been engaged

chiefly in lumbering. He is a man of pleasing address, of good

business talent and thoroughly reliable.

ELIAS F. DRAKE is a native of Ohio, in which state he lived until

1861, when he came to St. Paul. His boyhood days were spent on a farm;

later he engaged in mercantile pursuits, and still later studied law

under the instruction of Justice Swayne of the United States supreme

court, and was admitted to practice in all the courts of Ohio and in

the United States court. After a short and successful term of

practice, he became cashier of the State Bank of Ohio, and in that

capacity spent ten years of his life. During that time he served three

terms in the legislature, being speaker one session, during which the

late Gov. Swift was clerk of the house.

In politics Mr. Drake was a Whig, and afterward a Republican. During

his residence in Ohio he was active in promoting the improvements of

the country, successfully building several leading turnpike roads and

a few railroads.

In 1861 he came to Minnesota, and, put in operation the first

railroad in the State, a road between St. Paul and St. Anthony Falls.

In 1863 he was president of the Winona & St. Peter railroad during the

construction of the first ten miles. Soon after, he, with some

associates, took hold of the Minnesota Valley railroad, and completed

it to Sioux City, Iowa, in 1872. He is president and land commissioner

of this company. Mr. Drake represented Ramsey county in the state

senate in 1874-75.

NORMAN W. KITTSON was born at Sorel, Lower Canada, March 5, 1814. In

May, 1830, he engaged as an employe of the American Fur Company, and

in that capacity came to the Northwest. From the summer of 1830 to

that of 1832 he occupied the trading post between the Fox river and

the Wisconsin. The following year he operated on the headwaters of the

Minnesota, after which he spent a year on Red Cedar river, in Iowa. In

1834 he came to Fort Snelling, where he was sutler's clerk till 1838.

The winter of 1838-39 he spent with his friends in Canada. On his

return in the spring he began business on his own account in the fur

trade, at Cold Springs in the vicinity of Fort Snelling, which he

continued till 1843, when he entered the American Fur Company as

special partner, having charge of all the business on the headwaters

of the Minnesota, and along the line of the British possessions, and

operating in that field till 1854. During that summer he entered into

partnership with Maj. Wm. H. Forbes, in the general Indian trade, at

St. Paul, and went there to reside in the fall of that year. The

partnership continued till 1858, and Mr. Kittson continued his

northern business till 1860, when he closed out. In 1863 he accepted

the position of agent for the Hudson Bay Company at St. Paul, and went

into the steamboat and transportation business on the Red River of the

North. From 1851 to 1855 Mr. Kittson was a member of the territorial

council, and was mayor of the city of St. Paul in 1858. He was the

oldest of the pioneers of Minnesota, except Joseph Dajenais, a French

Canadian, now residing at Faribault. Mr. Kittson died July 10, 1888,

on a railroad train near Chicago. His body was brought to St. Paul for

burial.

HASCAL RUSSELL BRILL was born in the county of Mississquoi, Canada,

Aug. 10, 1846. He was educated partly at Hamline University, then

located at Red Wing, and finished at Ann Arbor, Michigan. He studied

law and was admitted to practice at St. Paul in December, 1869, and

formed a partnership with Stanford Newel. Three years later he was

elected probate judge and served two years. In 1875 he was appointed

by Gov. Davis to fill the vacancy in the court of common pleas caused

by the death of Judge W. S. Hall, and a few months later was elected

by the people to fill the same position. In politics Judge Brill is

Republican. He was married Aug. 11, 1873, to Cora A. Gray, of

Suspension Bridge, Niagara county, New York.

WARD W. FOLSOM, brother of Simeon P. and W. H. C. Folsom, was born in

Tamworth, New Hampshire, Oct. 13, 1824, but in early life removed with

his parents to Skowhegan, Maine, and in 1846 came to Arcola,

Minnesota. In 1848 he removed to St. Croix Falls and in 1851 to

Taylor's Falls, where he kept the Chisago House and engaged in

lumbering until 1857, when he removed to St. Paul, which city has

since been his home. He was employed for three years during the Civil

War in the quartermaster's department at St. Louis, Missouri. In 1865,

with health greatly shattered, he returned to St. Paul. He was married

to Sydney Puget, of St. Louis, in 1852. They have two adopted sons.

GORDON E. COLE was born in Berkshire county, Massachusetts, June 18,

1833; received his education at Sheffield Academy, Massachusetts, and

at the Dane law school of Harvard University, from which school he

graduated in 1854. He practiced law two years in his native town, came

to Minnesota, and located in Faribault in 1847. In 1859 he was elected

attorney general and served three consecutive terms. He served one

year as state senator, and a year in compiling state statutes. He has

been a railroad attorney and has filled many honorable positions. He

was married in August, 1855, to Stella C. Whipple, of Shaftsbury,

Vermont, who died in June, 1872, leaving three children. Feb. 14,

1874, he was married to Kate D. Turner, of Cleveland, Ohio.

JAMES SMITH, JR., was born in Mount Vernon, Knox county, Ohio, Oct.

29, 1815. He obtained a good practical, common school education, and

was besides largely self taught. He read law three years in Lancaster,

Ohio, was admitted to the bar in 1839, and practiced law in his native

town for seventeen years. In 1856 he came to St. Paul, where he has

been associated in practice with Judge Lafayette Emmett, John M.

Gilman and J. J. Egan. Since the building of the St. Paul & Duluth

railroad he has been its attorney, general manager and president.

Mr. Smith was in the state senate in 1861-62-63 and 67, and proved a

careful and able legislator. As a lawyer he stands deservedly high. He

was married to Elisabeth Martin, Jan. 18, 1848. They have four

children.

WILLIAM PITT MURRAY is of Irish descent. He was born in Hamilton,

Butler county, Ohio, in 1827; came to Centreville, Indiana, in 1844;

attended school there, graduated at the State Law School at

Bloomington in 1849, and the same year came to St. Paul, where he has

practiced law ever since. He has also taken an active part in the

politics of the city and State. He has probably assisted in the

passage of more laws than any other man in the State. He was a member

of the territorial house of representatives in 1852-53 and 57, and of

the territorial council of 1854-55, acting as president in the latter

year. He was a member of the Democratic wing of the constitutional

convention in 1857; was a representative in the state legislatures of

1863 and 1868, and a state senator in 1866-67, 1875-76, and has

besides served sixteen years in the city council of St. Paul. He has

been county and city attorney since 1876. He has been honored beyond

most public servants and has a county named after him. He was married

to Carolina S. Conwell, of Laurel, Indiana, April 7, 1853. They have

three children living.

HENRY HALE.--Judge Hale was born in Vermont in 1816; studied law and

was admitted to practice in his native state. He came to St. Paul in

1856 and opened a law office on Bridge Square. He took an active part

in the politics of the State and vehemently opposed the $5,000,000

loan bill. He has since retired from law practice, and is now a

successful dealer in real estate.

JAMES GILFILLAN, son of James and Janet (Gilmor) Gilfillan, was born

in Bannockburn, Scotland, March 9, 1829. His parents came to America

in 1830 and located at New Hartford, New York. He was educated in the

common schools, read law and was admitted to practice in 1850. He

removed to Buffalo, New York, where he practiced law until 1857, when

he removed to St. Paul and opened a law office. In 1862 he enlisted in

Company H, Seventh Minnesota Volunteer Infantry, became its captain

and before the close of the war was commissioned colonel of the

Eleventh Minnesota Infantry. In 1869 he was appointed to a vacancy on

the supreme bench of the State and again in 1875. The same year he

was elected to the office for seven years, at the end of which time he

was re-elected. He was married June 4, 1867, to Miss Martha McMasters,

of St. Paul. They have six children.

CHARLES DUNCAN GILFILLAN, a younger brother of James, was born in New

Hartford, New York, July 4, 1831. He was educated in the common

schools, Homer Academy and Hamilton College. After leaving college, in

1850, he located in Missouri, and a year later came to Stillwater,

Minnesota, where he read law with Michael E. Ames, was admitted to the

bar in 1853 and removed to St. Paul in 1854, where he engaged for

about twelve years in the practice of his profession. Since that

period he has been engaged in furthering various public enterprises,

among them the St. Paul Water Works, of which he was the founder and

for many years manager. He has occupied various public positions,

always with credit to himself. He was the first recorder of

Stillwater; was a member of the state legislatures of 1864-65, and

1876, and a member of the senate from 1878 to 1881, inclusive. At the

session of 1878 he was chairman of the railroad committee and the

committees on judiciary and education. In politics he is a Republican.

Mr. Gilfillan was married to Emma C. Waage, of Montgomery county, New

York, who died in 1863, leaving no issue. In 1865 he married Fanny S.

Waage, sister of his first wife. They have four children.

ALEXANDER WILKIN was born in Orange county, New York, in December,

1820. He studied law with his father, Judge Samuel J. Wilkin, and

practiced awhile at Goshen. In 1847 he enlisted in the Tenth New York

Regulars for service in the Mexican War, and was commissioned captain.

In the spring of 1849 he came to St. Paul; practiced law; was

appointed United States marshal in 1851, and served until 1853. He

visited Europe during the Crimean War, and studied the art of war

before Sebastopol. At the breaking out of the Rebellion, he raised the

first company for the first regiment, acted with conspicuous bravery

at the battle of Bull Run, and was commissioned major of the Second

Minnesota, lieutenant colonel in the same regiment, and colonel of the

Ninth Minnesota, all in the same year, 1862. He took part in the

Indian campaign, but at its close returned South, his regiment being

attached to the Sixteenth Army Corps, under Gen. A. J. Smith. He was

advanced to the position of brigade commander, and was killed at the

battle of Tupelo, Mississippi, July 14, 1864. Wilkin county,

Minnesota, bears his name.

WESCOTT WILKEN, a brother of Alexander, was born at Goshen, New York,

in 1827, received a good education, graduating at Princeton College in

1843, and studied law at New Haven Law School in 1846. He practiced

law in Sullivan county, New York, and was county judge four years. In

1856 he came to St. Paul and formed a partnership with I. V. D. Heard;

was elected judge of the district court in 1864, and re-elected every

succeeding term, without opposition.

S. C. WHITCHER was born in Genesee county, New York, in 1821. He came

to Amador, Chisago county, Minnesota, in 1853, and to St. Paul in

1858. He was married to Helen M. Olds, in New York, in 1840. Their two

sons are Charles and Edward.

MAJ. THOMAS MCLEAN NEWSON was born in New York City, Feb. 22, 1827, of

Scotch-Irish parentage. His paternal grandfather was paymaster in the

army during the war of 1812. His father, Capt. George Newson,

commanded a military company in New York City for seventeen years.

Three uncles were in the war of 1812. His father removed to New Haven,

Connecticut, in 1832, and both parents died there in 1834. The son,

after his parents' death, was placed in a boarding school. When he

left the school he learned the printer's trade, and on arriving at his

majority entered into partnership with John B. Hotchkiss in the

publication of the _Derby Journal_, in Birmingham, Connecticut. During

this period he wrote poetry, delivered lectures, and took an active

part in political affairs. He was secretary of the first editorial

association in Connecticut, and started and conducted for a year the

first daily penny paper in the State. He was one of the originators of

the reform school and an efficient promoter of its interests.

He came to St. Paul in 1853, where he was first associated with Joseph

R. Brown in the editorial department of the _Pioneer_, but the

following spring, in company with others, started the _Daily Times_,

which he edited until 1860, when he leased the material to W. R.

Marshall. The _Press_ was the outgrowth of this movement. He was one

of the founders of the Republican party in the State and was sole

delegate of his party in Minnesota to the Pittsburgh national

convention.

At the outbreak of the Rebellion he entered the service of his

country, was commissioned commissary of subsistence and subsequently

appointed acting assistant quartermaster, with the rank of captain. At

one time he was chief commissary at St. Cloud. He left the army with a

splendid record for honesty and capacity, with the brevet rank of

major, conferred for meritorious service, and the offer of a position

in the regular army, which he declined. In 1866 he was commander and

president of a company which explored the Vermillion Lake region

prospecting for precious metals. He was the first to assay the iron

ores, now so famous, in that region. In later years we find him

prospecting amongst the Black Hills, enjoying the wild life of the

frontier and devoting some attention to literature. While there he

wrote a drama of "Life in the Hills" and delivered lectures at various

times and places, achieving in this line an enviable success. Since

this period he has written and published an interesting work, entitled

"Thrilling Scenes Among the Indians," drawn from his own observation

and experience; also "Pen Pictures and Biographical Sketches of Old

Settlers of St. Paul, from 1838 to 1857," a rich and racy book of

seven hundred and thirty-two pages, in which the driest biographical

details are enlivened with amusing anecdotes and witty comments, in

which naught is set down in malice, but every line glows with the

genial spirit of the author. He has in contemplation another volume on

the same subject. He has also published "Heleopa," "Indian Legends"

and "Recollections of Eminent Men." Maj. Newson is a man of varied and

miscellaneous gifts. He is a ready writer, a fluent and eloquent

speaker, a journalist, a historian and the oldest editor in Minnesota.

He is corresponding secretary of the National Editorial Association,

and the first and only honorary member of the State Fire Association;

he is a geologist, mineralogist and assayer, a member of the G. A. R.,

of the Masonic and Odd Fellows lodges, and of the Junior Pioneers. He

is broad-gauged and popular in his views and positive in the

expression of his opinions. He was married to Miss Harriet D. Brower,

in Albany, New York, in 1857, and has a family of five girls and one

boy, May, Hattie, Nellie, Jessie, Grace, and T. M. Newson, Jr.

[Illustration: MAJ. T. M. NEWSON, THE OLDEST EDITOR IN THE STATE.]

[Illustration: CAPT. HENRY A. CASTLE, ONE OF MINNESOTA'S PIONEER

EDITORS.]

COL. ALVAREN ALLEN was born in New York in 1822; came to Wisconsin in

1837, and to St. Anthony Falls in 1857, where he engaged in the

livery, staging and express business. In 1859 he followed railroading;

in 1873 he bought Col. Shaw's interest in the Merchants Hotel of St.

Paul, for $40,000, and Col. Potter's interest for $275,000, property

now held at $500,000. In 1887 he rented the property to Mr. Welz. Col.

Allen is a genial man, and has friends all over the continent. He was

the second mayor of St. Anthony Falls, and has held various public

positions in St. Paul.

[Illustration: H. P. HALL.]

HARLAN P. HALL.--The writer has been unable to obtain any sketch of

the history of Mr. Hall. We have to say that he has been an

enterprising journalist in St. Paul. He was the founder of the _Daily_

and _Weekly_ St. Paul _Dispatch_; also of the St. Paul _Daily_ and

_Weekly Globe_. He is a fluent, versatile writer, and a genial

associate.

STEPHEN MILLER, a native of Perry county, Pennsylvania, was born Jan.

7, 1816. Being in straitened circumstances he early commenced a life

of toil, supported himself and to a great extent educated himself. In

1858 he removed to St. Cloud, Minnesota, and engaged in mercantile

pursuits. In 1860 he served as delegate to the Republican convention

at Chicago that nominated Lincoln for the presidency. In 1861 he

enlisted as a private soldier, but rose rapidly from the ranks, being

commissioned as a lieutenant colonel of the First Minnesota Infantry,

then as colonel of the Seventh Minnesota Infantry. He was in command

of this regiment at the execution of the thirty-eight condemned Indian

murderers at Mankato. In 1863 he was commissioned as brigadier general

but resigned to accept the position of governor of Minnesota. In 1871

he removed from St. Paul to Windom. In 1873 he was in the Minnesota

house of representatives. In 1876 he was presidential elector. In 1839

he was married to Margaret Funk, of Dauphin county, Pennsylvania. They

have had three sons. One son was killed at the battle of Gettysburg.

Gov. Miller died in 1878, at Windom, Minnesota.

CHAPTER XXII.

DAKOTA COUNTY.

This county, a rich farming district, lies on the west bank of the

Mississippi between Ramsey and Goodhue counties. It was originally

well diversified with timber and prairie lands, and is well watered by

the tributaries of the Mississippi and Minnesota rivers. Vermillion

river, which flows through this county, has near its junction with the

Mississippi a picturesque waterfall, now somewhat marred by the

erection of mills and manufactories.

HASTINGS,

Lying near the mouth of the Vermillion river, is a wide-awake,

thriving city, beautifully located on the banks of the Mississippi. It

has a fine court house, good hotels, manufactories and business

blocks. The Hastings & Dakota railroad has its eastern terminus here.

The St. Paul & Milwaukee, Burlington & Northern railroads pass through

the city. The river is bridged at this place.

FARMINGTON,

Near the centre of the county, on the Chicago, St. Paul & Minneapolis

railroad, is a thriving business village. West St. Paul has encroached

largely upon the north part of the county.

BIOGRAPHICAL.

IGNATIUS DONNELLY.--The parents of Ignatius Donnelly came from the

Green Isle in 1817, settling in Philadelphia, where Ignatius was born,

Nov. 3, 1831. He was educated in the graded and high schools of his

native city, graduating at the latter in 1849, and taking his degree

of master of arts three years later. He read law with Benjamin Harris

Brewster, and was admitted to the bar in Philadelphia in 1852, and

practiced there until 1856, when he came to Minnesota and located at

Ninninger, and purchasing from time to time nearly 1,000 acres of

land, devoted himself to farming, not so busily, however, as to

prevent him from taking a prominent part in public affairs. A

captivating and fluent speaker, and besides a man of far more than

ordinary native ability and acquirements, he was not suffered to

remain on his Dakota farm. In 1859 he was elected lieutenant governor

of the newly admitted state, and was re-elected in 1861, serving four

years. He served his district in the thirty-seventh, thirty-eighth and

thirty-ninth congresses. During his congressional term he advocated

many important measures, taking an advanced position in regard to

popular education, and the cultivation and preservation of timber on

the public lands. For his advocacy of the last named measure he was

much ridiculed at the time, but has lived to see his views generally

understood, and his measures to a great extent adopted in many of the

Western States. He advocated amending the law relating to railroad

land grants, so as to require their sale, within a reasonable period,

at low prices.

When he entered Congress, he gave up his law practice, and since his

last term he has devoted himself chiefly to farming, journalism and

general literature. In July, 1874, he became editor and proprietor of

the _Anti-Monopolist_, which he conducted several years. Within the

last decade he has published several works that have given him both

national and transatlantic fame. His works on the fabled "Atlantis"

and "Ragnarok" prove him to be not only a thinker and scientist, but a

writer, the charms of whose style are equal to the profundity of his

thought. His last work on the authorship of the Shakespearean plays

has attracted universal attention, not only for the boldness of his

speculations, but for the consummate ingenuity he has shown in

detecting the alleged cipher by which he assumes to prove Lord Bacon

to be the author of the plays in question. The book has excited much

controversy, and, as was to be expected, much adverse criticism. Mr.

Donnelly was married in Philadelphia, Sept. 10, 1855, to Miss

Catherine McCaffrey of that city. They have three children living.

FRANCIS M. CROSBY.--The ancestors of Mr. Crosby were of Revolutionary

fame. He was born in Wilmington, Windham county, Vermont, Nov. 13,

1830. He received a common and high school education and spent one

year at Mount Cæsar Seminary, at Swansea, New Hampshire. He studied

law and was admitted to practice at Bennington, Vermont, in 1855. He

served in the Vermont house of representatives in 1855-56. He

continued the practice of law until 1858, when he came to Hastings and

engaged in the practice of law. He served as judge of probate court in

1860-61, acted as school commissioner several years in Dakota county,

and was elected, in 1871, judge of the First Judicial district

comprising the counties of Goodhue, Dakota, Washington, Chisago, Pine,

and Kanabec. He held the first courts in Pine and Kanabec counties.

Judge Crosby is held in high esteem, not only by the bar, but by the

people at large. He is gentlemanly in his manners, yet prompt and

decisive in action.

He was married to Helen A. Sprague, in New York, May 13, 1866. Mrs.

Crosby died in 1869. He married a second wife, Helen M. Bates, in New

York, in 1872. They have two sons and three daughters.

HON. G. W. LE DUC was born at Wilkesville, Gallia county, Ohio, March

29, 1823. His father, Henry Savary Duc, was the son of Henri Duc, an

officer of the French Army, who came over with D'Estaing to assist the

colonies in the Revolutionary struggle. The grandfather, after some

stirring adventures in Guadaloupe, where he came near being murdered

in a negro insurrection, escaped and came to Middletown, Connecticut,

in 1796, where he was married to Lucy, daughter of Col. John Sumner,

of Duryea's Brigade, Continental Troops, and a member of the Sumner

family which came to Massachusetts in 1637. The father was married to

Mary Stewell, of Braintree, New York, in 1803. The family name,

originally written Duc, was changed to Le Duc in 1845. The grandfather

removed to Ohio and founded the town of Wilkesville. G. W. Le Duc, the

grandson, spent his early life at this place, but was educated at

Lancaster Academy, a school that numbered amongst its scholars Gen. W.

T. and Senator John Sherman, the Ewing brothers, and others prominent

in the history of the country. He entered Kenyon College in 1844,

graduated in 1848, and was employed for awhile by the firms of H. W.

Derby & Co., of Cincinnati, and A. S. Barnes & Co., of New York.

Meanwhile he studied law, and in 1850 was admitted to practice in the

supreme court of Ohio. July 5, 1850, he came to St. Paul and engaged

in selling books, supplying the legislature and the government

officers at the Fort, but gradually turned his attention to practice

in land office courts. At the breaking out of the Rebellion he

enlisted, and was assigned to duty as captain A. Z. in the Army of the

Potomac. During his term of service he was promoted to the grades of

lieutenant colonel, colonel and brigadier general by brevet. Since the

war his most important official position has been that of commissioner

of agriculture through the administration of President Hayes. In 1856

he removed to Hastings, and has ever since been identified with the

progress and prosperity of that city, and is the owner of large

property interests there.

[Illustration: HON. G. W. LE DUC.]

GOODHUE COUNTY.

This county lies on the west bank of the Mississippi river, between

the counties of Dakota and Wabasha. It derived its name from James M.

Goodhue, pioneer editor and publisher in St. Paul. It is a rich and

populous county. The county seat is Red Wing, a thriving city of 7,000

inhabitants, located on the banks of the Mississippi a short distance

below the mouth of Cannon river, and at the outlet of several valleys

forming a larger valley, well adapted to become the site of a city.

The hills surrounding the city are high, bold and many of them

precipitous. Mount La Grange, commonly known as Barn Bluff, a large

isolated bluff, a half mile in length and three hundred and twenty

feet in height, stands between the lower part of the city and the

river. Part of the county lies upon the shore of Lake Pepin, and

includes the famous Point no Point, a bold promontory extending far

out into the lake, with a curve so gradual that the eye of the person

ascending or descending the lake is unable to define the Point, which

appears to recede before him as he approaches, till at last it

disappears, when looking backward he sees it in the part of the lake

already traversed. Cannon river, a considerable stream, passes through

the county from west to east.

Cannon Falls, on this river, once a picturesque and wild waterfall, is

now surrounded by the mills, manufactories and dwellings of a

flourishing village, named after the falls. Goodhue county was

organized under territorial law. In 1845 the principal point was Red

Wing. There we found a Swiss missionary named Galvin, an Indian farmer

name Bush and the noted Jack Frazer, a half-breed trader, all living

in log buildings. Mr. Galvin had a school of Indian children. Near by

was an Indian cemetery--burying ground it could not be called, as the

bodies of the dead were elevated upon the branches of trees and upon

stakes to be out of reach of animals. The bodies were wrapped in

blankets and exposed until the flesh had decayed, when the bones were

taken and buried. Red Wing's band of Sioux Indians had their

encampment here. It is said that Red Wing, the chief for whom the

village and city was afterward named, chose for his burial place the

summit of Barn Bluff, and that when he died he was buried there,

seated upon his horse, with his face turned to the Happy Hunting

Ground, the Indians heaping the earth around him till a huge mound was

formed. The legend may need confirmation, but a mound is there to this

day, on the highest part of the bluff, and the high spirited chief

could certainly have wished no nobler grave.

Red Wing city bears few traces of its humble origin. It is a fine,

compactly built city, with handsome public and private buildings. It

was for some years the seat of Hamline University, now removed to St.

Paul.

BIOGRAPHICAL.

HANS MATTSON.--Col. Mattson is a native of Onestad, Sweden. He was

born Dec. 23, 1832. His parents were Matts and Ilgena (Larson)

Mattson, both now residents of Vasa, Minnesota. The son was educated

at a high classical school in Christianstad, and in his seventeenth

year entered the military service as a cadet and served one year.

Disliking its monotony, and having an adventurous spirit he embarked

for America, where he found himself abjectly poor, and worked as a

cabin boy on a coasting vessel, as a farm hand, and afterward with a

shovel on an Illinois railroad until 1853, when he secured a position

as an emigrant agent, whose business it was to select homes for

Swedish colonists. He, with others, came to Vasa, Goodhue county,

Minnesota, where he dealt in real estate, studying law meanwhile with

Warren Bristol. He was admitted to the bar in 1858. He was elected

county auditor the same year and served till 1860, when he entered the

army as captain of Company D, Third Minnesota Infantry. At the end of

four years he left the service with the rank of colonel. After his

return from the war he formed a law partnership with C. C. Webster,

and a year later he accepted the position of editor of a Swedish

newspaper in Chicago. In 1867 Gov. Marshall appointed him secretary of

the state board of immigration, which position he held several years,

doing the State excellent service. In 1869 he was elected secretary of

state, but before his term of office expired resigned to accept the

appointment of land agent of railway corporations, which enabled him

to spend four years abroad.

[Illustration: L. F. Hubbard]

Col. Mattson was for some time editor of the _Staats Tidning_, a

Swedish paper in Minneapolis, and a large owner and general manager of

the _Swedish Tribune_ published in Chicago. He was a presidential

elector in 1876. He was again elected secretary of state for 1887-88.

He is a versatile writer and a fluent speaker, a frank, outspoken and

honorable man. He was married Nov. 23, 1855, to Cherstin Peterson, a

native of Bullingslof, Sweden. They have five children living.

LUCIUS FREDERICK HUBBARD was born Jan. 26, 1836, at Troy, New York. He

was the oldest son of Charles F. and Margaret (Van Valkenburg)

Hubbard, his father being a descendant of the Hubbard family that

emigrated from the mother country and settled in New England in 1595;

his mother coming from the Holland Dutch stock that has occupied the

valley of the Hudson river since its earliest history.

The father dying early, the son found a home with an aunt at Chester,

Vermont, until he was twelve years old, when he was sent for three

years to the academy at Granville, New York. At the age of fifteen he

was apprenticed to a tinner at Poultney, Vermont, and completed his

trade at Salem, New York, in 1854, when he removed to Chicago for

three years. He then removed to Red Wing, Minnesota, and started the

Red Wing _Republican_. In 1858 he was elected register of deeds of

Goodhue county. In 1861 he sold out his interest in the _Republican_

and ran for the state senate, but was defeated by the small majority

of seven votes. In December, 1861, he enlisted in Company A, Fifth

Minnesota Volunteers, and was elected captain. In March, 1862, he

became lieutenant colonel; in August, colonel; and for conspicuous

gallantry at the battle of Nashville was promoted to the position of

brigadier general. He participated in the battles of Farmington; of

Corinth, where he was severely wounded; of Iuka, the second battle of

Corinth; of Jackson and Mississippi Springs; in the siege of

Vicksburg; in the battle of Richmond, Louisiana; of Greenfield,

Louisiana; of Nashville, where he was wounded and had two horses

killed under him, and at the siege of Spanish Fort. He was mustered

out in October, 1865, at Mobile, Alabama. He was engaged in

twenty-four battles and minor engagements and won an enviable record

for his intrepidity and coolness. He returned to Red Wing with broken

health, the result of fatigue and exposure.

In 1866 he engaged in the grain business at Red Wing, and soon

thereafter in milling operations on a large scale in Wabasha county.

In 1872 he purchased an interest in the Forest mill, at Zumbrota,

Goodhue county, and in 1875, with others, bought the mills and water

power at Mazeppa, in Wabasha county, the mills soon after being

rebuilt and enlarged.

In 1868 he raised, through his personal influence, the money necessary

for the completion of the Midland railway, a line extending from

Wabasha to Zumbrota.

He subsequently projected and organized the Minnesota Central railway

(Cannon Valley), to run from Red Wing to Mankato. As president of the

company he secured the building of the road from Red Wing to

Waterville, about sixty-six miles.

In 1878 Gen. Hubbard was nominated for Congress in the Second district

of Minnesota, but declined. In 1872 he was elected to the state

senate, and again in 1874, declining a re-election in 1876. In the

senate he was regarded as one of the best informed, painstaking and

influential members. He was on the committee to investigate the state

treasurer's and state auditor's offices, and was largely instrumental

in recommending and shaping legislation that brought about the

substantial and much needed reform in the management of those offices.

He was also one of the three arbitrators selected to settle the

difficulties between the State and the prison contractors at

Stillwater. He was appointed commissioner, with John Nichols and Gen.

Tourtelotte, in 1866, to investigate the status of the state railroad

bond, levied in 1858, and finally settled in 1881.

On Sept. 28, 1881, Gen. Hubbard was nominated for governor of

Minnesota, and was elected by a majority of 27,857, the largest

majority ever received by any governor elected in the State. In 1883

he was renominated and re-elected by a very large majority.

Gov. Hubbard is an affable, genial, courteous gentleman, whose

integrity has never been questioned; a man of the people, and in

sympathy with them and the best interests and general prosperity of

the State.

Gov. Hubbard was married in May, 1868, at Red Wing, to Amelia,

daughter of Charles Thomas, a merchant of that place. He has three

children, two boys, aged seventeen and eleven respectively, and a

girl.

WILLIAM COLVILLE is of Scotch descent on his father's side. The

ancient homestead of the family at Ochiltree is mentioned by Sir

Walter Scott in his novel, "The Antiquary." On his mother's side he is

of Irish descent. His ancestors participated in the American

Revolution. He was born in Chautauqua county, New York, April 5, 1830;

was educated at the Fredonia Academy, taught school one winter, read

law in the office of Millard Fillmore and Solomon L. Haven, of

Buffalo, and was admitted to the bar in 1851. He practiced law at

Forestville three years, and then removed to Red Wing, Minnesota. His

first winter he spent in St. Paul as enrolling clerk of the

territorial council, and the winter following was secretary of the

council. In the spring of 1855 he established the Red Wing _Sentinel_,

a Democratic paper, and conducted it until the Civil War broke out. In

1861 he entered the service as captain of Company F, First Minnesota

Infantry, and served with that regiment three years, conducting

himself with such gallantry as to win promotion. He was wounded at the

first battle of Bull Run, at Nelson's Farm and at Gettysburg, the last

wounds received maiming him for life, and necessitating a close of his

military career. At the end of three years he left the service with

the rank of colonel, and edited the _Sentinel_ until January, 1865,

when he took his seat as representative in the legislature. At its

adjournment he was appointed colonel of the First Minnesota Heavy

Artillery which was stationed at Chattanooga till the close of the

war. Col. Colville was mustered out of the service with the brevet

rank of brigadier general. In the autumn of 1865 he was elected

attorney general of the State on the Union ticket and served two

years. In 1866 he ran for Congress in opposition to the Republican

nominee. In 1877 he was elected as a Democrat to the lower house of

the state legislature in the strongest Republican county in the State.

The same year he was appointed by President Cleveland register of the

land office at Duluth, to which place he has removed his residence. He

was married to Miss Jane E. Morgan, of Oneida, New York, in 1867, a

descendant of Elder Brewster, who came over in the Mayflower.

MARTIN S. CHANDLER, for twenty-two years sheriff of Goodhue county,

Minnesota, was born in Jamestown, New York, Feb. 14, 1827. He came to

Goodhue county in 1856 and engaged for awhile farming at Pine Island.

He was elected county commissioner in 1856, and served until 1858,

removing meanwhile to Red Wing, which has since been his home. In 1859

he was elected sheriff of Goodhue county, and held the office for

eleven consecutive terms, until 1882, when he was elected to the state

senate. He was presidential elector in 1872. He was appointed surveyor

general in 1883, which office he held until 1887. He was married to

Fannie F. Caldwell, of Jamestown, New York, in 1848. His only

daughter, Florence C., is the wife of Ira S. Kellogg, of Red Wing, one

of the oldest druggists in the State.

CHARLES MCCLURE was born in Virginia in 1810; was graduated at

Lewisburg, Virginia, in 1827; studied law and was admitted to practice

in 1829. He came to Minnesota and located at Red Wing in 1856, where

he opened a law office. In 1857 he was a member of the constitutional

convention, presidential elector in 1861, state senator in 1862-63 and

in 1864, judge of the First district, filling the vacancy caused by

the retirement of Judge McMillan. At the fall election of the same

year he was elected judge of the First district and served seven

years. This district embraced Washington, Chisago, Goodhue and Dakota

counties. Judge McClure is a man of unquestionable ability and

integrity.

HORACE B. WILSON was born in Bingham; Somerset county, Maine, March

30, 1821. His grandfather settled in Maine twenty years prior to the

Revolution. He had a fair common school education until sixteen years

old, when he attended the Maine Wesleyan Seminary, graduating four

years later. He devoted himself chiefly to teaching, and studied law

meanwhile, but never practiced. He taught in Cincinnati, Ohio,

Lawrenceburg and New Albany, Indiana, until 1850, when he was elected

city civil engineer, which position he filled six years. In 1858 he

removed to Red Wing, Minnesota, and taught, as professor of

mathematics, natural science and civil engineering in Hamline

University four years. In 1862 he enlisted in Company F, Sixth

Minnesota Infantry, was elected captain, and mustered out at the close

of the war. His military service was quite arduous, including

campaigning against the Sioux until 1864, when the regiment was

ordered South and attached to the Sixteenth Army Corps.

In 1866 he was appointed superintendent of schools for Goodhue county.

In 1870 he was appointed state superintendent of schools, which

position he held five years. He was elected representative in the

state legislature in 1877, and subsequently he served four terms as

senator, and was president _pro tem._ of that body during the trial of

E. St. Julien Cox, and in the absence of the lieutenant governor

presided during the trial. For the past few years he has devoted

himself to civil engineering, and has had charge of the public

improvements of Red Wing. In 1844 he was married to Mary J. Chandler,

who died in 1887.

Among the prominent early settlers of Red Wing not mentioned in our

biographical notices were William Freeborn, for whom Freeborn county

was named, and who was a senator in the fifth, sixth, seventh and

eighth legislatures. Judges Welch and Wilder, W. C. Williston and

Warren Bristol, lawyers, both state senators from Goodhue, and the

latter a judge in Arizona. Rev. Chauncey Hobart, D.D., a Methodist

pioneer preacher, and author of a history of Methodism in Minnesota

and an autobiography; Rev. Peter Akers, D.D., an eminent educator;

Rev. M. Sorin, D.D., an eloquent preacher, and Rev. Samuel Spates and

J. W. Hancock, prominent as missionaries, the latter the first pastor

located in the village. Andrew S. Durant, first hotel keeper; Calvin

F. Potter, first merchant. W. W. Phelps and Christopher Graham were

appointed to the land office in 1855.

WABASHA COUNTY.

This county, named in honor of a Sioux chief, lies on the west shore

of the Mississippi river and Lake Pepin, between Goodhue and Winona

counties. It has a majestic frontage of bold bluffs on the lake and

river. From the summit of these bluffs stretch away broad undulating

prairie lands, with occasional depressions, or valleys, caused by the

streams tributary to the river.

Wabasha village is the county seat. The county is traversed by the St.

Paul & Milwaukee railway, and the Zumbrota Valley Narrow Gauge

railroad has its eastern terminus at Wabasha village. A railroad from

Minneiska to Eyota, in Olmsted county, through Plainview, also passes

through this county. Lake City is a thriving village on the lake

shore, beautifully situated. The Grand Encampment, located about two

miles below Wabasha village, was once a point of great interest. It

was from time immemorial a camping ground for Indians. It has an

abundance of ancient mounds. The only people in the county in 1845,

when the author first visited this section, were the Campbell, Cratt,

Bessian, and a few other French families. Bailey and sons, Dr. Francis

H. Milligan, B. S. Hurd, Samuel S. Campbell, a prominent lawyer, and

Wm. L. Lincoln came later to Wabasha. Reed's Landing, at the foot of

Lake Pepin, was early settled by Messrs. Reed, Fordyce, Richards, and

others. This point controls an immense trade for the Chippewa river,

which empties its waters into the Mississippi just opposite.

NATHANIEL STACY TEFFT is a native of Hamilton, Madison county, New

York, where he was born July 16, 1830. He was educated in the common

schools and academy; in 1848 commenced studying medicine and received

his diploma the same year at Cincinnati, after attending lectures at

the medical college in that city. In 1856 he came to Minnesota and

located in Minneiska, where he practiced medicine, served as

postmaster, justice of the peace, and member of the legislature. In

1861 he removed to Plainview, where he has taken rank as a leading

surgeon and physician in that part of the State. He has also served as

member of the state senate (in 1871-72). The writer had the pleasure

of meeting him in the legislature of 1858 and found him a strong

opponent of the $5,000,000 bill. Dr. Tefft was married to Hattie S.

Gibbs, of Plainview, Nov. 10, 1866.

JAMES WELLS.--In 1845 the writer found Mr. Wells living in a stone

trading house on the west shore of Lake Pepin, on the first high

ground on the shore above Lake City. Mr. Wells had a half-breed family

and was very reticent in his manner. He was a member of the first

territorial house of representatives. When the country became more

thickly settled he went West and was killed by the Sioux Indians in

the massacre of 1862.

WINONA COUNTY

Was named after the daughter of the Indian chief who, according to the

well known legend, precipitated herself from the famous rock on the

eastern shore of Lake Pepin, which has ever since been known as

"Maiden's Rock." The county lies on the west shore of the Mississippi,

below Wabasha county. The frontage of the bluffs on the river is

unsurpassed for grandeur and beauty, the bluffs here attaining an

altitude of six hundred feet above the river. The natural castles and

turrets crowning these bluffs remind the traveler of the towns on the

Rhine and Danube, and it is difficult to realize that they are the

handiwork of Nature and not of man. The most striking of these bluffs

occupies a position in the rear of the beautiful city of Winona,

overlooking the city and the valley, and affording from its summit

possibly the finest view on the river. The city of Winona lies on a

spacious plateau between the bluffs and the river. In 1845 a solitary

log cabin, the resting place of the mail carrier, marked the site, and

a large Indian village, belonging to the band of Chief Wapashaw,

occupied a portion of the present site of the city. All traces of this

village have long since disappeared, and given place to one of the

fairest and most flourishing cities on the river. The First State

Normal School is located here. The St. Paul & Milwaukee railroad

passes through, and the Winona & St. Peter railroad has its eastern

terminus in this city. It is also the western terminus of the Green

Bay & Mississippi. The Chicago, Burlington & Northern crosses the

river here, and has a depot in the city.

DANIEL S. NORTON, at the time of his death United States senator from

Minnesota, was born in Mount Vernon, Ohio, in April, 1829. He was

educated at Kenyon College, Gambier, Ohio; enlisted in the Third Ohio

Volunteer Infantry in 1846 for service in the Mexican War; had his

health seriously impaired in the service; spent two years in

California, Mexico and Central America; returned to Ohio and read law

with his father-in-law, Judge R. C. Hurd, practiced in Mount Vernon,

Ohio, with Hon. William Windom and came with him to Minnesota in 1855,

locating at Winona. Mr. Norton served as senator in the first state

legislature, where the writer served with him on several committees,

among them the committee on the $5,000,000 bond bill, a bill which Mr.

Norton strongly and earnestly opposed, predicting clearly its

disastrous results. He also served as senator in the legislatures of

1861-64 and 65, when he was elected to the United States senate, which

position he held at the time of his death, in 1870. He was twice

married, first in 1856, to Miss Lizzie Sherman, of Mount Vernon, Ohio,

who died in 1862. The second time to Miss Laura Cantlan, of Baltimore,

in 1868.

WILLIAM WINDOM, a native of Ohio, came to Winona in 1855. He had been

admitted to practice in 1853, and formed a partnership with D. S.

Norton in Mount Vernon, Ohio, who came with him to Winona, where they

continued their law partnership. Mr. Windom has been quite prominent

in the politics of the State and county, having served in the United

States senate two terms, from 1871 to 1883. He was also a

representative in Congress from 1859 to 1869. He served as secretary

of the treasury to fill a vacancy. During his congressional career he

was an ardent supporter of the Union, and won the respect of the

nation for his unswerving firmness in upholding his principles. He is

a man of great executive ability, and has used his talents and his

wealth, of which he has accumulated a considerable share, in the

interests of the public. He has been heavily interested in the

building of the Northern Pacific and other railroads, and in real

estate. His opportunities have been great, he has wisely employed

them, and richly deserves the success he has achieved.

CHARLES H. BERRY, the first attorney general of the state of

Minnesota, was born at Westerly, Rhode Island, Sept. 12, 1823. He

received an excellent school and academic education, graduating at

Canandaigua Academy in 1846. He afterward read law and was admitted to

practice at Rochester in 1848. He practiced his profession at Corning,

New York, until 1855, when he removed to Winona and opened the first

law office in that city. He was associated until 1871 with C. N.

Waterman. When Minnesota became a state, in 1858, he was elected

attorney general and served two years. He was state senator in 1874-75

and has been United States commissioner since 1873. He takes great

interest in local and state affairs, especially in educational

matters. He has been for many years connected with the city school

board and for eight years its president. He was also largely

instrumental in locating the State Normal School at Winona. Mr. Berry

is a Democrat in politics, is prominent in Masonic circles and a

leading member of the Episcopal church. He was married to Frances E.

Hubbell, of Corning, New York, Nov. 14, 1850. They have one daughter,

Kate Louise, married to Prof. C. A. Morey, principal of the State

Normal School.

THOMAS WILSON was born in Tyrone county, Ireland, May 16, 1827. He

received his education in this country, graduating at Meadville

College, Pennsylvania, in 1852. He studied law, was admitted to the

bar in 1855, and in the same year came to Winona and entered the law

firm of Sargent & Wilson, known a few years later as Sargent, Wilson &

Windom. He was a member of the Republican wing of the constitutional

convention in 1857. He was elected district judge of the Fourth

district, taking his seat in 1858, and serving six years. In 1864 Gov.

Miller appointed him to a vacancy on the supreme bench, caused by the

resignation of Judge Flandrau, and in the fall of the same year he was

elected chief justice for a term of seven years. In 1869 he resigned

this position to resume his law practice. In 1881 he was elected as a

representative, and from 1883 to 1886, inclusive, as a senator in the

state legislature. He was elected as a representative to Congress in

1887.

THOMAS SIMPSON is of Scotch parentage, but was born in Yorkshire,

England, May 31, 1836. He came to America with his parents when a

child, to Dubuque county, Iowa. His educational advantages were good,

and he learned, when not in school, to assist his father, who was a

miner, smelter and farmer. He studied engineering and surveying with

E. S. Norris, of Dubuque, and was engaged in government surveys from

1853 to 1856, when he settled in Winona, studied law, and was admitted

to the bar in 1858, when he formed a law partnership with Judge Abner

Lewis and Geo. P. Wilson. In addition to his law business he has been

a heavy dealer in real estate and money loaning. There are few public

enterprises in Winona which he has not actively promoted. He was a

delegate to the national convention that nominated Lincoln for the

presidency in 1864, also to the convention that nominated Grant in

1868. He served as state senator in 1866-67. He has been an

influential member of the Methodist church. He was married Oct. 30,

1860, to Maggie Holstein, of Lewisburg, Pennsylvania. They have three

sons.

WM. H. YALE was born Nov. 12, 1831, at New Hartford, Connecticut; was

educated at Sheffield Institute; came to Winona in 1857, and practiced

law. He was state senator in 1867-68, 1876-77, and lieutenant governor

from 1870 to 1874.

Other prominent citizens of Winona are: Dr. James Monroe Cole, the

oldest physician in the city; Royal Day Cone, one of the first

merchants; Judge Wm. Mitchell; ---- Norton, a lumberman and county

treasurer several years; W. W. Phelps, first president of the State

Normal School; ---- Hough, builder of the first large hotel; Hodgins,

Yeomans & Laird, lumbermen.

CHAPTER XXIII.

MISCELLANEOUS BIOGRAPHIES.

PIERRE BOTTINEAU was born in the Red River settlement, now Dakota, in

1817. His early life was passed amongst the Ojibways in the employ of

various fur companies. He has lived an eventful life and endured many

hardships as a hunter, trapper and guide. He was early noted as a

pilot to and from the Selkirk settlement. In 1843 he removed his

family from Selkirk to St. Paul. In 1845 he removed to St. Anthony

Falls, east side, where he laid out an addition to the new village. He

was also, in 1851, the first settler at Maple Grove, or "Bottineau's

Prairie," in Hennepin county. When he came to Fort Snelling he was

employed by Gen. Sibley as a guide. In 1856 he assisted in selecting

locations for forts. In 1858, after the establishment of Fort

Abercrombie, he located the village of Breckenridge, now in Wilkin

county, Minnesota. In 1859 he accompanied Geologist Skinner in his

exploring expedition, having for its object the survey and location of

salt mines, and was guide to Col. W. H. Noble's wagon road expedition

to Frazer river. In 1860 he accompanied a military expedition with

Gov. Ramsey to conclude treaties with the Northern Minnesota

Chippewas. In 1862 he accompanied Capt. Fisk's Idaho expedition, and,

in 1863, Gen. Sibley's expedition to the Missouri. Mr. Bottineau now

resides at Red Lake Falls, Polk county, Minnesota.

ANDREW G. CHATFIELD, a member of the Minnesota district bench at the

time of his death, was born in the town of Butternuts, Otsego county,

New York, Jan. 27, 1810. In 1838 he was a member of the New York

assembly; in 1848 he removed to Racine, Wisconsin, where he was

elected county judge. In 1853 he was appointed associate justice of

the supreme court of Minnesota Territory, and he made his home on a

beautiful prairie in Scott county, on which he laid out the town of

Belle Plaine. He acted as judge four years and then resumed the

practice of law. In January, 1871, he was elected judge of the Eighth

Judicial district, which he held until his death, which occurred Oct.

3, 1875. Judge Chatfield was married in 1836. His widow and an only

daughter, Mrs. Cecilia Irwin, reside at Belle Plaine.

HAZEN MOOERS.--Biographical details of Mr. Mooers are scant and

unreliable. He was probably born about the year 1796. It is said that

he was in the battle of Plattsburgh, September, 1814, when he was a

youth of eighteen years of age, and that he acted as a guard in

protecting government and private property. We find by the Minnesota

historical collections that he came to Gray Cloud island in 1835 and

remained till 1843. It is probable that he remained there till 1848.

He was commissioner of St. Croix county, Wisconsin, in 1840-41 and

1842. When he came to Gray Cloud island he was accompanied by a Mr.

Robinson, and located in section 23. While at Gray Cloud he was

married to a daughter of Dickson, the trader, and sister of Mrs.

Joseph R. Brown. We have been unable to find mention of him later than

1848.

JOHN MCDONOUGH BERRY was born at Pittsfield, New Hampshire, Sept. 18,

1827. Mr. Berry received an excellent education at the Pittsfield

Academy, Phillips Academy and at Yale College, from which he graduated

in 1847. He was a member of the Phi Beta Kappa Society. He was in the

law office of Ira Paley, later chief justice of New Hampshire. In 1850

he was admitted to the bar at Concord, New Hampshire. He commenced

practice at Alton Corners, Belknap county, New Hampshire. Three years

later he came West and located at Janesville, Wisconsin. In 1855 he

moved to Faribault, this State, and at once came into prominence. In

1856 he was a member of the territorial house of representatives and

chairman of the judiciary committee. In 1862 he was sent to the state

senate from Rice county, and in 1864 he was elected associate justice

of the state supreme court, a position he has filled with honor to

himself and the bar. He removed to Minneapolis in 1879 and died there,

greatly lamented, Nov. 15, 1887. An obituary notice from the daily

press gives a fair estimate of his character:

"He was not a man that mingled much in society or put himself forward

on any occasion, yet he had a very social, genial disposition, and

every one that knew him valued the acquaintance highly. As a judge he

was universally esteemed. His decisions were always marked by a

peculiarly vigorous grasp of bottom facts. His mind was a naturally

judicial one. His own ideas were fresh and original, and his way of

expressing them unusually vigorous. He devoted himself wholly to his

judicial duties and to his family. He was a great reader and student

and a great home man. His affections were wholly centred in his wife

and children. His distaste for ostentation and publicity is evidenced

in his expressed wish for a private funeral."

He was married May 26, 1853, to Alice A. Parker, of Roscoe, Illinois,

who survives him.

MARK H. DUNNELL is of Scotch descent. He was born July 2, 1823, at

Buxton, Maine. He was raised on a farm, but graduated at Waterville

College, Maine, in 1849, and for three years following was engaged in

teaching. In 1852 he was elected to the Maine house of

representatives, and afterward served five years as state

superintendent of schools. He studied law, was admitted to the bar in

1856, and in 1860 practiced his profession in Portland. In 1861 he was

appointed United States consul to Vera Cruz, Mexico. Before going to

Mexico he was appointed colonel of the Fifth Maine Volunteers, and

participated in the first battle of Bull Run. He resigned his

consulship in 1862, and returned to Maine, where he aided the governor

in recruiting and organizing regiments for the military service. In

1865 he came to Winona, Minnesota, was a member of the Minnesota house

of representatives in 1867, and afterward served three years as state

superintendent of instruction. He resigned this office to take a seat

in Congress, and represented his district a period of ten years. He

was married Nov. 20, 1850, to Sarah A. Parrington, of Goshen, Maine.

They have three children living.

JAMES HEATON BAKER, son of Rev. Henry Baker, a Methodist preacher, and

Hannah (Heaton) Baker, was born in Monroe, Ohio, May 6, 1829. He

graduated at Ohio Wesleyan University in 1852. In 1853 he purchased

the Sciota _Gazette_, at Chillicothe, Ohio. In 1855 he was elected

secretary of state on the ticket headed by Salmon P. Chase as

governor. In 1857 he removed to Minnesota, where, for two successive

terms he was elected to the same office. At the outbreak of the Civil

War he resigned, and accepted a colonel's commission in the Tenth

Minnesota Volunteers. In 1863 his command was ordered to the South,

and he was detached and made provost marshal of St. Louis, and

subsequently of the department of Missouri, in which position he

served until the close of the war, he being meanwhile promoted to a

brevet brigadier generalship.

At the close of the war he was appointed register of the land office

at Booneville, Missouri, but in two years resigned and returned to his

farm in Blue Earth county, Minnesota.

In 1871 President Grant appointed him commissioner of pensions, a

position for which he was singularly well fitted. He resigned in 1875,

and was appointed by President Grant surveyor general of Minnesota.

Gen. Baker has been prominent in Masonic circles, and has contributed

much to the newspaper and periodical press. He was married Sept. 25,

1852, to Rose R., daughter of Reuben H. Thurston, then of Delaware,

Ohio, now of Mankato, Minnesota. This estimable lady died at

Washington City, March 21, 1873, leaving two sons, Arthur and Harry E.

Gen. Baker, since his appointment as surveyor general, has resided at

Mankato. He served in 1885 and 1886 as railroad commissioner for the

State.

HORACE BURTON STRAIT is of Virginia Revolutionary stock. He was born

in Potter county, Pennsylvania, Jan. 26, 1835. His educational

advantages were such only as the common schools afforded, and he is

largely self cultured. He came to Minnesota in 1855, and engaged in

farming near Shakopee, but in 1860 moved to the county seat, and

engaged in mercantile business. In August, 1862, he enlisted in

Company I, Ninth Minnesota Volunteers, commanded by Col. Alexander

Wilkin; was commissioned as captain, and in 1864 as major; was

mustered out at the close of the war, since which time he has been

engaged in milling, banking and farming. He was president of the First

National Bank of Shakopee. He served as mayor of Shakopee in

1870-71-72, when he was elected to Congress, and served by continuous

re-elections until 1888, when J. L. MaDonald became his successor. He

was emphatically a working member. He has been twice married. His

first wife died in 1872, leaving one child.

JUDSON WADE BISHOP was born at Evansville, New York, June 24, 1831. He

received an academic education at Fredonia Academy, and at Union

Academy, Belleville, New York. Leaving school at the age of sixteen,

he was employed for several years as clerk and book-keeper and in

teaching. Having a taste for civil engineering he fitted himself for

usefulness in that department at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

of Troy, New York, and in 1853 secured a position as draughtsman on

the Canadian Grand Trunk railway. At the completion of the road, in

1857, he obtained employment in railroad surveying, making his

residence at Chatfield until 1861, where he purchased a newspaper, the

Chatfield _Democrat_. At the first call for troops in 1861 he sold his

office, volunteered as a soldier, and was mustered in as captain of a

company in the Second Regiment, June 26, 1861. He was mustered out at

the close of the war with the brevet rank of brigadier general, and

resumed railroad work, in which he has since been active and

conspicuous. For some years he was manager of the St. Paul & Sioux

City. His connection with railroad enterprises necessitated his

removal in 1864 to Le Sueur, in 1868 to Mankato and in 1873 to St.

Paul, which has since been his home. He has also been a heavy dealer

in real estate. He was married Jan. 11, 1866, to Nellie S. Husted, of

Galena, Illinois, who died Sept. 19, 1878, leaving three sons, Charles

Husted, Edwin Judson and Robert Haven.

JOHN LOUIS MCDONALD.--The paternal ancestors of our subject were

Highlanders, of the clan "McDonald of the Isle." John Louis was born

in Glasgow, Scotland, Feb. 22, 1836; came with his parents to America

in 1842, lived a few years in Nova Scotia, then removed to Pittsburgh

where he received an academic education. He removed to Belle Plaine,

Scott county, Minnesota, in 1855, read law with Judge Chatfield, and

was admitted to practice at Shakopee in 1858, removing thither three

years later, and continuing in practice, serving as probate judge from

1859 to 1864 and publishing and editing the Belle Plaine _Enquirer_,

and later, the Shakopee _Argus_, serving two years as prosecuting

attorney, four years as superintendent of schools, two years as state

representative (1869-70) and three years as state senator (1874-75 and

1876). In 1877 he was elected district judge, and served seven years.

In 1888 he took his seat as representative in Congress. As a judge he

is thoroughly well informed, clear-sighted and impartial.

THOMAS H. ARMSTRONG was born in Milan, Ohio, Feb. 6, 1829. He

graduated from Western Reserve College in 1854, commenced the practice

of law at La Crosse, Wisconsin, in 1856, practiced at High Forest,

Minnesota, until 1870, when he discontinued practice. Three years

later he moved to Albert Lea, Minnesota, and established the Freeborn

County Bank.

Mr. Armstrong has acted a prominent part in the legislation of the

State, having been a representative in the legislatures of 1864 and

1865, and, as lieutenant governor, president of the senate for the

four succeeding terms. He was elected speaker of the house in the

legislature of 1865. As a presiding officer he was courteous,

dignified, and fair in his rulings, and an excellent parliamentarian.

April 1, 1868, he was married to Mrs. Elisabeth M. Butman, daughter of

John Burgess, of Cleveland, Ohio.

AUGUSTAS ARMSTRONG, a younger brother of the foregoing, and a

prominent citizen of Albert Lea, died in 1873.

MOSES K. ARMSTRONG, another brother, has represented Dakota in

Congress.

JAMES B. WAKEFIELD was born at Winstead, Litchfield county,

Connecticut, March 21, 1828. He graduated at Trinity College,

Hartford, in 1846; studied law, and was admitted to practice in 1851;

came to Shakopee, Minnesota; practiced law two years and removed to

Blue Earth City. He has been called to fill various and responsible

public positions. He was a member of the legislature several terms,

serving as representative in 1858, 63 and 66, and as senator in

1867-68-69. He served as deputy Indian agent at the Lower Sioux agency

from 1856 to the Indian outbreak, and in 1869 was appointed receiver

of the Winnebago land office, which position he held six years. From

1875 to 1879 he served as lieutenant governor of Minnesota, and from

1884 to 1886 as member of Congress. He served as a delegate to the

Republican convention which nominated President Grant in 1868, and to

the convention which nominated President Hayes in 1876. Mr. Wakefield

was married in August, 1864, to Miss Nannette Reinhart, of Blue Earth

City.

WILLIAM WALLACE BRADEN was born in Iberia, Ohio, Dec. 3, 1837. He was

educated in the district schools and reared as a farmer. In November

he came to Fillmore county with his father, and engaged in farming. He

was a member of the legislature in 1866-67, and has served three

terms as county treasurer. During the Civil War he served three years

with the rank of lieutenant, and then of captain in Company K, Sixth

Minnesota Volunteers, and was for some time detached from his command

as provost marshal of Southern Missouri, with headquarters at

Springfield. Capt. Braden is prominent as a Mason, and as a Republican

takes an active interest in the politics of the State and nation. He

was elected state auditor in 1881, and re-elected in 1885. He was

married March 7, 1866, to Addie Griswold, of Pennsylvania.

REUBEN BUTTERS was born in Union, Lincoln county, Maine, May 26, 1816.

He received such education as could be obtained at winter schools, and

employed himself chiefly in clerking and mercantile pursuits until

1851, when he came to Minnesota and became the first permanent settler

in the Minnesota valley above Shakopee. He made the first claim at Le

Sueur, having, in connection with Messrs. Thompson and Lindsey, a

station at that place, also at Kasota. He has been engaged chiefly in

farming. He has also a stone quarry and store in Kasota, and does a

fair amount of trading. Mr. Butters was a member of the first state

legislature, and has served seven or eight sessions since. He was

county commissioner many years. In politics he is a Democrat.

Mr. Butters has been twice married, first in November, 1847, to

Elizabeth Hill, of Cleveland, Ohio, and second in May, 1861, to Mrs.

Mary E. Rogers, of Maine. He died March 29, 1888.

MICHAEL DORAN, a most successful business man and prominent in

political affairs, having served six terms in the state senate, was

born in the county of Meath, Ireland, Nov. 1, 1829. He received but

little education before coming to this country in 1850, when, although

over twenty-one years of age, he obtained two years' schooling. He

landed in New York City, remained in the State about a year and

removed to Norwalk, Ohio, where he farmed and kept a grocery store. In

1856 he came westward and located at Le Sueur, where he engaged in

farming. In 1860 he was elected county treasurer and served and held

the office eight years. Since 1870 he has been engaged in banking,

farming and real estate operations. He is also one of the owners of

the elevator and flouring mill at Le Sueur.

In politics he is a Democrat and was an elector on the McClellan

ticket. His senatorial terms were from 1872 to 1875 and 1877 and

1879. He has been twice married. His first wife was Ellen Brady, of

Norwalk, Ohio, married in May, 1855. His second wife was Catherine J.

Grady, of Le Sueur, married Feb. 10, 1864.

ANDREW MCCREA was born in New Brunswick in 1830, received a common

school education and learned the business of farming and lumbering.

His father having died early, the support of a mother and crippled

brother devolved upon him. He was married to Jane Murphy, in New

Brunswick, when he was twenty-one years of age. Mrs. McCrea died in

1878. He married a second wife in 1880. His family consists of eight

sons and one daughter. He came to Minnesota in 1854, removed to

Stearns county in 1858, and to Otter Tail county in 1872, where he now

resides in the town of Perham. He was a member of the legislature of

1876-77, and of the senate of 1878 to 1882, inclusive. In 1885 he was

appointed one of the commissioners to locate the second state prison.

JOHN W. BLAKE was born in Foxcroft, Maine, in 1839. His parents moved

to Wisconsin in 1840. He received a good education in the common

schools, in Milton Academy, and Wisconsin State University, and became

a civil engineer. He served as a soldier during the war of the

Rebellion. In 1872 he came to Minnesota, located at Marshall, Lyon

county, and the same year was elected a representative in the

legislature. He was a member of the senate during the years 1875,

1876, 1882, and 1884.

KNUTE NELSON, born in Norway, came to America, studied law at

Wisconsin University, and was admitted to the bar. He came to

Alexandria in 1870, where he practiced law. He was a senator in the

seventeenth, eighteenth, nineteenth and twentieth legislatures, and

was elected representative to Congress from the Fifth Minnesota

district in 1884 and 1886. Mr. Nelson is a man of unquestioned ability

and force, a strong Republican, and an enthusiastic advocate of a

modified tariff.

W. R. DENNY was born at Keene, New Hampshire, in 1839; received an

academic education, and after spending eight years in Wisconsin, came

to Carver, Minnesota, in 1867. He served in the state legislatures of

1874, 1876, 1879, and 1881. He was appointed United States marshal

from 1882 to 1886. He was Grand Master of the Masonic fraternity in

1884-5. He was married in Wisconsin in 1863, and has a family of four

children.

[Illustration: PRESENT HOME OF THE AUTHOR ERECTED BY HIM A.D. 1855.]

APPENDIX.

MISCELLANEOUS INCIDENTS, ITEMS AND STATISTICS, INCLUDING AN

ACCURATE ACCOUNT OF THE VARIOUS TREATIES BETWEEN THE UNITED

STATES GOVERNMENT AND THE INDIAN TRIBES INHABITING THE

TERRITORIES OF WISCONSIN AND MINNESOTA.