The Iowa History
Project
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The MAKING of IOWA
CHAPTER XI
THE FIRST WHITE SETTLER
Although the beginning of the
settlement of the present State of Iowa dates June 1, 1833, when the Black Hawk
purchase was thrown open by the government, the settlers who came in then were not
the first white people to live within the borders. For some years before
1833 Indians had permitted other whites-namely Frenchmen-to dwell on Iowa soil.
Trappers and hunters were they, and representatives of great fur trading
companies. Also, military posts established throughout the country of the
Upper Mississippi Valley, in Iowa as elsewhere, were garrisoned by soldiers,
who added to the white population.
Therefore when the Black Hawk
Purchase was invaded by eager settlers, already Eastern Iowa had a small
contingent, not Indians.
Julien Dubuque had lived and
died in Iowa before the country had even been thought of as a home for
civilization. He crossed into Iowa in 1788, and so far as records show he
was the first white man to take up a residence here. He was alone among
the Indians, and for all we know was then the only white person north of what
is now Missouri and between the Mississippi and the Rocky Mountains.
Dubuque was born in 1762, in
the district of Three Rivers, about sixty miles above Quebec, Canada. During
those days the spirit of adventure was in the air. Everybody traded with
the Indians, everybody sought new country and new fields to conquer, and
everybody encountered hardships in forest and on stream. Right at the
doors of the men of the eighteenth century lay unknown regions. A
continent containing all kinds of wonders was each boy's front yard. Dubuque,
when only 23, started out to see what he could find in this vast playground.
He went to Prairie du Chien,
above the mouth of the Wisconsin River. Prairie du Chien originally meant
"dog prairie." This point occupies a prominent place in the
history of the settlement of the Upper Mississippi Valley. For a long
time it was a trading station of the British, and in the War of 1812 the
Americans tried in vain to hold a fort built here by the government. At
this trading post young Dubuque stopped, in 1785, and began to traffic with the
Indians across the Mississippi, where McGregor, Iowa, now is.
A squaw, one of the wives of Peosta,
a Fox warrior, had found lead in the ground near here, and Dubuque heard about
it from the Indians he met. The Foxes dug out lead ore, and used the
metal in trading and for bullets, etc. Dubuque believed that he ought to
have a hand in this, and in 1788 he succeeded in obtaining from the Indians the
sole right to work the lead mines.
This was a fine thing. He
immediately moved over the river, and settled in the camp of the Kettle Chief,
or Chief Kettle, a prominent Fox. This village was at the mouth of
Catfish Creek, two miles below the present city of Dubuque.
The Frenchman took with him ten
companions, French-Canadians, to help him. The treaty by which the Foxes
gave him the mining property was singed at Prairie du Chien September 22, 1788,
and it is probable that the new owner lost no time in crossing and taking
possession.
Dubuque built himself a cabin,
planted corn, and in other ways made himself comfortable in the village. He
erected a mill to be run by horse power, and constructed a furnace in which to
smelt the lead he mined, and prepare it for market.
Twice a year he loaded his
goods onto several boars, and went down the Mississippi to St. Louis. He
usually was accompanied by Fox chiefs and braves, as well as by French
employes. His arrival in St. Louis always created quite a stir, for he
was looked upon as a great and wealthy trader from a wild country. He was
regarded with much curiosity and admiration, and balls were given in his honor.
Having sold and traded his
goods, he loaded what he had received onto his boats, and the fleet proceeded
up the river to the mines. We can picture to ourselves the appearance to
this flotilla, going and coming. The chiefs and braves we may be sure put
on their gayest paint and feathers, and their proudest mein. They had not
lived so close to civilization that they had been made dissipated by liquor and
gambling, and so they were fine specimens of the Red Man.
Dubuque himself was a small
man, but stout and wiry, with black hair and eyes. He was very courteous
and polite, and his manners were extremely gallant, especially when in St.
Louis he met some ladies. Living among the Indians as they did, he and
his French companions dressed in buck skins-leggins and shirt and moccasins-and
wore round caps of fur, maybe with a feather sticking jauntily up from one
side. Long, flintlock rifles, and belt with knife and hatchet, and powder
horn slung across the shoulder, completed the costume.
The boats would be loaded high
with lead and furs, and doubtless when they swept swiftly down the lonely river
toward St. Louis the Frenchmen sang a merry song, after the fashion of the
race. Leaving St. Louis the furs and lead would be replaced by powder and
salt and many other things that could not be procured so easily at Prairie du
Chien, not forgetting beads and trinkets used in trading with the Indians.
When the Dubuque fleet arrived
at St. Louis, and when it left, salutes were fired from rifles by the Indians,
to add impressiveness to the occasion.
Dubuque lived in the village
nearly twenty-two years. He mined and traded steadily, and beyond that we
know nothing of his adventures. His white employes were overseers,
smelter, etc., and the mining was done by the Indians themselves. Dubuque
kept a rude general store, where he exchanged cloth and beads and whatever else
he thought best, for furs and lead. Only the old men and the women did
the mining, the braves considering it undignified to work. Mining was
carried on in a very simple fashion. The Indians dug into the hills as
far as they could, and bore away the ore in baskets.
Dubuque claimed that the
Indians sold him the land where he mined, and that he paid for it in goods. But
the Foxes maintained that they only gave him a permit to mine. In 1796,
after he had been west of the Mississippi for eight years, he asked the Spanish
government, which then owned Louisiana Territory, to transfer to him the title
to all this tract and to some additional country not mentioned in his treaty
with the Indians. Baron de Carondelet, governor of Louisiana, at Orleans,
granted the request. Dubuque called his mines "The Mines of
Spain."
When Dubuque died the Indians
would not let anybody else work the mines, because, they said, no white man had
a right there, and Dubuque had been there only by special permission. The
treaty, which is still in existence, seems to support this claim by the Foxes.
Dubuque was not a good business
man, evidently, for he became so indebted to Auguste Chouteau, an important store
keeper at St. Louis, that in 1804 he conveyed to the merchant a great extent of
land, in order to cancel some of the obligations.
When he died the remainder of
the land was to become the property of Chouteau or his heirs.
So in time Choutear's heirs demanded
from the government the possession of much ground where Dubuque city now is. The
case was not decided until 1853. By this time settlers were occupying the
territory, and Iowa was a State. The supreme court determined the Indians
had not sold Dubuque the land, and that it was not his to dispose of, and that
the settlers could stay. This created much rejoicing.
Dubuque died a bankrupt, poor
in spite of the fact that he seems to have had unusual opportunities to become
rich. His mines were a fine success, he was in the midst of the Indians
of a fur country, and the savages trusted him. They looked upon him as a
great medicine man. His influence over the Foxes and over the
Winnebagoes, across the river, was extraordinary.
He was reputed to be a magician.
Once he frightened the Foxes by telling them he would set the creek on
fire. He instructed some of his men to pour oil on the water above the
village, and when the inflammable coating floated down to a point opposite the
cabins he touched a match to it. The water appeared to blaze up, which so
frightened the Indians that they ever after regarded Dubuque with awe.
Dubuque was named by the
Indians "Little Cloud." Evidently he had quite an establishment
at the village, for when Lieutenant Pike ascended the Mississippi in 1805
Dubuque welcomed him by a salute from a cannon.
In March, 1810, Dubuque died,
in the village of the Foxes. The Indians mourned him deeply, and treated
his body with highest honors in their power. Chiefs and warriors from all
the tribes to which he was known gathered and escorted his remains to the
grave. Women followed, singing funeral songs. At the grave the
chiefs spoke, detailing his virtues and praising them. Then sorrowfully
the Indians left him in his rude resting place.
His burial occurred on the
crest of a bluff projecting 200 feet above the Mississippi, and situated a
short distance north of Kettle Chief's village. The Indians erected over
the grave an enclosure, with stone sides and a wooden roof. At one end
was a cedar cross ten feet high, said to have been made by Dubuque. The
arms were inscribed thus, in French:
"Julien Dubuque, miner of
the mines of Spain; died March 24, 1810, aged 43 1/2 years."
It is believed the age is an error,
and that he was forty-eight. Beside him was buried a principal chief, who
asked this favor. For many years the indians thought Dubuque would return
and dwell with them again. As long as possible the Sacs and Foxes visited
the grave every year, and other tribes whenever they could, and each Indian
threw onto the spot a stone. Finally there was quite a heap of small
stones here.
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