E. B. Washburn letter

WASHBURN, DODGE

Posted By: Ken Wright (email)
Date: 7/15/2008 at 09:00:50

Maquoketa Excelsior
October 7, 1882

A Glimpse at the Past.

The following letter from the distinguished western pioneer E. B. Washburn to Gen. A. C. Dodge will be read with interest by old settlers hereabout.

CHICAGO, Sept. 14, 1882.

My Dear General: - I beg to thank you very sincerely for a copy of the Burlington Daily Gazette of the 21st ultimo, containing the proceedings of the annual Pioneer and Old Settlers’ Association of Des Moines County. Mrs. Washburn and myself have both read them with a real interest. The proceedings cover a period anterior to my advent in the west, but there are many incidents referred to that I am familiar with, and I also find the names of many persons that I had an acquaintance with in our early times. I was at Burlington, then only a village, in the last days of March, 1840, on my way up the Mississippi River, on the steamboat “Amaranth,” Capt. Geo. W. Atchison. We stopped several hours at Burlington putting off freight. I strolled up into the town and for the first time met James W. Grimes. That acquaintance thus made ripened into a friendship, personal and political, both in the west and in Congress, which lasted till his death. Leaving my own native New England to seek a home in the Northwest in the spring of 1840, I came by the way of Washington, crossing the mountains by stage to Wheeling. It was my purpose at the time I left home to settle in Iowa Territory, and at Washington I made the acquaintance of Hon. W. W. Chapman, the territorial delegate. He received me with great courtesy and kindness, and gave me letters of introduction to many prominent men in the territory. My point of destination was first to Stephenson, now Rock island, Ill., where my brother, the last Gov. C. C. Washburn of Wisconsin, was at that time studying law in the office of Joseph B. Wells, Esq., afterwards Lieutenant Governor of Illinois. Many persons whom I met at Stephenson recommended Galena to me as the best place in the Northwest to practice law. After due consideration I concluded to locate there and gave up my intention of settling in Iowa. I never for a moment regretted the selection for a residence and home I had made. I landed at Galena on the first day of April, 1840, and it was my home until I returned from France in the fall of 1877.

You speak of Judge Thos. S. Wilson, who was one of the first territorial judges of Iowa Territory. I knew him well. He admitted me to the bar of Iowa at Bellevue, Jackson County, early in April, 1840, and only a few days after the celebrated “Battle of Bellevue.” Gehan was the United States marshal at that time. Soon after the battle there was an intense excitement. The session of the court was a very interesting one. I met there for the first time many prominent lawyers and among them I may mention Judge James Grant of Davenport, Hon. Timothy Davis, with whom I afterward served four years in Congress, Stephen Hempstead, subsequently Governor of the state, Jas. Crawford and Jas. Churchman. I knew Chas. Mason well, and might almost say intimately, for nearly 40 years. When stopping at Burlington I saw this then Governor of the territory – Gov. Lucas – a tall, spare man of unassuming dress and manners. Judge Williams of the territorial court got on board our boat to go to Bloomington, now Muscatine. He was genial, agreeable, full of talk and anecdote, and blowing the horn of the young territory, and particularly Bloomington, very loudly, of course. I have known Gen. Jones a long time, and was a guest under his hospitable roof at Sinsinnway Mound, Michigan, in the spring of 1841. I was present in the gallery of the United States Senate when you and Gen. Jones, in December, 1848, took your seats as the first senators from the State of Iowa. I saw you draw lots for the terms. You drew the short term and he drew the long term. This short term very soon expired, and I have an impression that the same legislature that elected you both re-elected you before its adjournment for a full term – six years. Gen. Jones drew into the four year class and was re-elected for six years by a succeeding legislature.

Of the three commissioners who laid off Burlington into town lots. I knew one of them – George Cubbage. He settled on a farm in Jackson County, Iowa, and, I believe, died there. He had a son, William P. Cubbage, who was for many years in business in Galena. It was not Alfred M. Harrison, of Galena, I think, who surveyed the town, but Geo. W. Harrison, a surveyor at Galena, and who, in 1838, was elected a State Senator for the Senatorial district embracing Galena, at that time.

I never knew you as well as I knew your father, but yet we have been a long time acquainted. You may not remember our once meeting at old Ste. Genevieve, which I believe is your birth place, and once sleeping in the same room at the old tavern.

As a delegate in congress from the territory of Iowa you served your constituents faithfully and well. As a Senator in Congress for the State of Iowa, you served with distinguished honor and great usefulness. Outside of political questions, there is no man in your state who ever has or who ever will challenge the wisdom of your votes or your actions during all your term of service. As we grow older we find the asperities of politics softened, and can look back with more pleasure on what we have done for the country then what we have done for party.

The reminiscences of early life in the west have for me the most fascinating interest. That is, indeed, the only excuse I can offer the length of this letter. I will close, therefore, by asking you to accept the assurance of the respect – and esteem with which I have the honor to subscribe myself, very faithfully,
Your friend and obedient servant,
E. B. WASHBURN