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Chapter Six
Pottawattamie County
Much
confusion and many conflicting statements regarding the organization of
Pottawattamie County, Iowa, are found in outstanding histories,
reference to each and all of which in this work is not deemed necessary
inasmuch as the purpose of its publication is to present facts
pertaining almost exclusively to the immediate vicinity of the city of
Council Bluffs, However, the organization of the county is intimately
connected with the selection and history of its capital city,
respecting which selection very little, if anything, has been
heretofore published. In a ' ' History of Pottawattamie County, Iowa,
from the Earliest Historic Times to 1907", by Homer H. Field and Hon.
Joseph R. Eeed, I have found only two references to the organization of
the county,
viz. :
"Although Pottawattamie County was
not organized until as late as September, 1848, its real history begins
at a much earlier date." (See page 1; Volume 1.)
On page 10 of the same work, referring to a later date, it is said :
"With the end of Mormon supremacy
the people began to look about to see where they were. The county,
which was much larger than now, was reduced to its present size, an
election was held, and A. H. Perkins, David D. Yearsly and George
Coulson were elected the first Commissioners. The first clerk was James
Sloan, and its first County Judge was T. Burdick, elected in 1851."
"The Historical Record, a Monthly Periodical, Devoted Exclusively to
Historical, Biographical, Chronological and Statistical Matters", is
the title of a Salt Lake City, Utah, publication, edited and
published by Andrew Jensen, of the Latter Day Saints Historian's
Office. On page 899 of Volume 8 of that work is found the following :
"At Kanesville the people were
anxious to have a postoffice established and a county organization
extended over the land on wliich they had settled. At some meetings
held in January, 1848, a pel i1 ion to the legislature of Iowa was
numerously signed, and Andrew II. Perkins and Henry W. Miller were
ehoscn delegates to carry and present said petition. They attended to
this business and learned that the legislature had made
provision for the organization whenever the judge of the 4th judicial
district of Iowa should decree that the 'public good requires such
organization'. They waited upon Judge Carrolton at Iowa City, who
informed them that he had appointed a Mr. Townsend to organize said
County."
On page 900 of the work last cited, reference is made to the county
organization, as follows:
"In March (1848) a pastoffice was
established at Kanesville, and Brother Evan M. Greene received the
appointment of postmaster. A county organization was also obtained, the
county being called Pottawattamie. The officers were : Isaac Clark,
judge of probate; George Coulson, Andrew H. Perkinsand David D.
Yearsley, county commissioners; Thomas Burdick, county clerk; John D.
Parker, sheriff; James Sloan, district clerk ; Evan M. Greene, recorder
and treasurer ; Jacob G. Bigler, William Snow, Levi Bracken and
Jonathan C. Wright, magistrates."
Each of the foregoing extracts speaks for itself. Those referring to
efforts made to secure a county organization, as well as those which
mention such organization as a fact accomplished in 1848, have
reference to a temporary organization of Pottawattamie County, pursuant
to an act of the State Legislature approved February 24, 1847, which
provided that:
"The country embraced within the
limits of what is called the Pottawattamie purchase, on the Missouri
river, in this State, be, and the same may be, temporarily organized
into a county, by the name of Pottawattamie, at any time when, in the
opinion of the judge of the fourth judicial district, the public good
may require such organization." (Laws of Iowa, 1st General Assembly of
the State, Chapter Ixxxiv, page /115.)
Thus the county was to embrace, and when organized did embrace, all of
the territory ceded to the United States by the treaty of June 5, and
17, 1846, which had theretofore been occupied by the Pottawattamie
Indians. As said in the portion of this work relating to the
Pottawattamies, the eastern part of the northern boundary of this
territory was never delimitated. It was to extend from a point on the
western boundary of the "lands of the Sac and Fox Indians" from which a
west line "would strike the sources" of the Little Sioux river, which
initial point was never exactly ascertained ; nor were the "sources" of
the Little Sioux river ever determined in connection with
the treaty of 1833, at Chicago, by which the Pottawattamie boundary was
prescribed. Assuming, however, that the "Second Correction Line",
established by the United States surveys in Iowa, approximates the
"west line" prescribed by the treaty, which would, with the other lines
mentioned, mark out an area of about five million acres, the quantity
the Indians were to occupy, it will be seen that, beginning at the
southwest corner of Iowa and proceeding eastward by tiers of counties,
the Pottawattamie County authorized by the act of 1848 comprised
territory within the present counties, viz. :
"All of Fremont, Page, Taylor,
and part of Ringgold; All of Mills, Montgomery, Adams, and part of
Union ; All of Pottawattamie, and parts of Cass and Adair ; All of
Harrison, Shelby, Audubon, and part of Guthrie; Part of Monona, All of
Crawford, and part of Carroll ; Part of Woodbury, All of Ida, and part
of Sac."
The area of the county was reduced to its present size and form by the
legislative act approved January 15, 1851. (Laws of Iowa, Regular
Session, 3d General Assembly, Chapter ix, pages 27-28.)
By an act of January 23, 1851 (Chapter xxvi. Laws of Iowa, 3d General
Assembly, Regular Session, page 56), provision was made for the
selection of a county seat for Pottawattamie County, the County
Commissioners being directed to designate two places to be voted for as
such, and order an election for the purpose. Notices of the places for
holding the election were to be posted in each township in the county
and published in the "Frontier Guardian". The following is a copy of
the published notice :
"NOTICE OF ELECTION.
"Notice is hereby given that on the first Monday, the 7th day, of April
next, at the Warehouse of F. J. Wheeling, in the precinct of Council
Bluffs, in the County of Pottawattamie, and at William H. Gooch &
Brother's Warehouse, on Hyde Street, in Kanesville, in the precinct of
Kanesville, in said County, an election will be held to establish the
Seat of Justice of said (/ounty ; that Kanesville is one of the plaees
to be ballotted for, for said Seat of Justice, the oth«^r is at the
residence of John D. Parker, at Pleasant Grove, about eight miles above
Kanesville, on the south sirle of Big Mosquito, and about five miles
from the Indian Mill. Also to be elected, or ballotted for, at said
election: one District Judge for the 6th Judicial District of the State
of Iowa; one School Fund Commissioner, for said County; one
Supervisor of Highways, for each of said precincts; and as many
Justices of the Peace and Constables for each of said precincts as it
lacks of two of each.
"Which said election is to be opened at nine o'clock in the morning and
continue open until six o'clock in the afternoon of the same day.
T. BuRDiCK, Clerk of the
Board of County Commissioners.
"Kanesville, March 7, 1851.
"N. B. — By a late Act of the Legislature, the County of Pottawattamie,
as nearly as can now be determined, extends about thirteen miles north,
eleven south, and twenty-eight east of Kanesville. Voters within these
limits are entitled to vote for the county seat." (Frontier Guardian,
March 7, 1851; page 2.)
The result of the election thus provided for was reported in the
Frontier Guardian of April 18, 1851 (page 2), as follows:
"ELECTION
"The first Monday of April, Inst., was the most disagreeable and stormy
day that we have ever witnessed in this country. It began to rain on
Sunday night, and continued to rain incessantly until about 12 o'clock
on Monday ; then it snowed and froze severely; and, consequently, we
had a very light vote to what would have been given if the day had been
fine ; yet, unfavorable as the day was, quite a goodly number turned
out at the election, the final result of which is officially given
below. "Pottawattamie County and Precincts, or dependencies: For Judge
of the Sixth Judicial District ; for James Sloan, 406 ; for Christopher
P. Brown, 71 ;
:Fremont County :
"For James Sloan, 7; for Christopher P. Brown, 91; for Burton, 2.
"No returns from any other county.
"E. M. Greene, Esq., was elected County Clerk without opposition, in
place of James Sloan, resigned.
"Calvin R. Clark was elected School Fund Commissioner.
"Kanesville elected Seat of Justice ; only seven votes cast against it.
"William Vanosdale and Jacob Degraw elected Justices of the Peace for
Kanesville Precinct.
"William H. Gooch and Roswell Ferry, Constables for Kanesville
Precinct.
"For Superintendent of Public Instruction: William G. Woodward, 397;
Thomas H. Benton, Jr., 51; William W. Spencer, 5."
In so far as the writer of this work is informed the information
relative to the county-seat election, and election of officers
mentioned,has never been recorded in any of the numerous histories of
Iowa, or of Pottawattamie County, heretofore published.
A discrepancy respecting the temporary organization of the county under
the act of 1848 appears between the statements made in the Field and
Reed History and those of the "Historical Record", above cited. The
former places it in September and the latter in March 1848.
The office of the County Clerk of Pottawattamie County was destroyed by
fire sometime in the "fifties", and practically all of its records went
up in smoke. Inasmuch as the matter published in the "Historical
Record" is based upon records kept at the time by oflScials of the
Mormon Church, who were on the ground, it would appear that the
information contained in it is the more reliable of the conflicting
allegations.
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