RECORDS

OF

THE OLDEN TIME;

OR,

FIFTY YEARS ON THE PRAIRIES.

EMBRACING

SKETCHES OF THE DISCOVERY, EXPLORATION AND
SETTLEMENT OF THE COUNTRY,

THE

ORGANIZATION OF THE COUNTIES OF PUTNAM AND MARSHALL,
INCIDENTS AND REMINISCENCES CONNECTED THERE-
WITH, BIOGRAPHIES OF CITIZENS, POR-
TRAITS AND ILLUSTRATIONS.

BY SPENCER ELLSWORTH.

LACON, ILL.

HOME JOURNAL STEAM PRINTING ESTABLISHMENT.

MDCCCLXXX.

1

PREFACE.

In the following pages we have endeavored to trace the early settlement of that portion of our State embraced in the counties of Putnam and Marshall, gathering up the forgotten records of each township and neighborhood, and telling for the benefit of their descendants the story of the brave men and women who wrested their homes from the savage, and turned a desert into the fairest land that beams beneath the sun.

It is not a "history," and does not claim to be, nor should it be judged as such, but in its pages we have sought to tell in plain, simple language, the story of our ancestors' lives, and string together for the amusement and instruction of their descendants the incidents and happeningssolemn, grotesque or ludicrous as they were that made up the warp and woof of their daily existence.

The old settlers are fast passing away. Many prominent actors in the scenes here depicted have paid the debt of nature, and the story of their lives is well nigh forgotten. But a few years more, and we shall see the last of that noble band carried to their final home. Much that is valuable has already passed into oblivion, and to rescue what remains has been our study. The faithfulness with which it has been performed can best be judged by the public.

At the outset of our task it was found that to reconcile dates and even statements of the same occurrence was impossible. Our sole dependence was restricted to the uncertain memory of a few feeble men and women, who had reached the stage of life when the "grasshopper is a burden," and forgetfulness is courted rather than deprecated. Human nature is weak, and forty years of slowly revolving time dims the brightest images graven on the tablets of the mind. At first we strove to reconcile these conflicting variations and strike a balance of probabilities, but the task was so hopeless that it was abandoned, and the plan adopted of giving each statement as received and allowing it to pass for what it was

ix.