Early Settlers and Settlements
In consequence of the difficulties that existed among the Indians, there were no
settlers this side of Equality until the year 1804, when seven brothers by the name
of Jordan, John and William Browning, Joseph Estes, and a man by the name of Barbrey,
a brother-in-law to the Jordans, from Smith County, Tenn, located in this county,
and built a fort and block-house where the residence of Judge William Elstun now
stands. These settlers were all related. John Browning's mother was Mollie Jordan,
sister to the seven Jordan brothers. John Browning was the father of James and Levi,
who were well known to nearly all citizens of the county. The latter still survives
and is a prominent merchant at Benton. Elias Jordan, the father of Moses, was one
of the seven Jordans. William Browning died in 1817. From the time of the building
of the fort until about the year 1815, little or no attempt was made to cultivate
the soil, the settlers subsisting almost entirely upon game, honey, and a little
corn, which they, by close watching, succeeded in raising and preventing the Indians
from stealing. While these early settlers were thus fortified, and in the year 1812,
James Jordan and Mr. Barbrey, while out of the fort gathering wood, were fired upon
by the Indians. Barbrey was killed and scalped. James Jordan was wounded in the
leg. After obtaining re-enforcements from Frank Jordan's Fort, which was then located
in what is now known as Williamson County, about three miles south of the first named
fort, the whites started in pursuit of the Indians, and followed them as far as the
Okaw River, but did not succeed in overtaking them. Barbrey was buried at the fort
and his grave still remains near the residence of Judge William Elstun. This was
the starting of the first graveyard in Franklin County.
The Jordan Settlement was made in what is now Cave Township.
John Browning returned to Tennessee in 1805, and came back to this county in 1806,
and lived about two years in Jordan's fort. About this date he guarded the mail
for one or two years, between Shawneetown and Kaskaskia, and afterwards assisted
the government surveyors in the survey of the lands of the county. In 1820 he
located on the Browning
Hill farm, and subsequently became a prominent Baptist minister, and died June 13,
1857. James K and William R Browning, twin brothers, and sons of John Browning
and wife, were the first white children born in the county. They were born Dec-
ember 24, 1810 in the Old Jordan fort. As pioneers and settlers, few did more than
John Browning and his wife. Coming here in 1804, they at once commenced to subdue
the soil and raise children, becoming the parents of eighteen (three set of triplets
- nine children at three births - and twins once). Two of the triplets, Joseph and
Jonathon, lived to be middle aged men, and raised quite large families." Other
early settlers of Cave Township were John McCreery with his family, and his son
Alexander with his young wife, who came from Kentucky in 1817. The former settled
in the place now known as the Fancy farm. Alexander McCreery brought his household
and kitchen furniture along with him in a pair of saddle bags. He settled the farm
now occupied by Judge Wm Elstun. Aaron Neal and his brother Moses, settled near
the present site of Parrish in 1812. (My note: The mother of Aaron and Moses Neal
was Nancy Jordan - their father Aaron Neal died in Pope County, IL) Isaac Moberly,
John Hall, Nathan Clampet, John W Swafford, Nathaniel Jones, John Plasters, Wm
Jackson, David Williams, James Isaacs, Thomas Lampley, J L Cantrell, John Harlow
and Henry Yost, were all early settlers in the southeastern part of the county.
John Jones and his son John, and his son Wiley, the father of W R Jones, the ex-
sheriff of Franklin County, came from Tennessee in 1830 and settled in Cave Township.
The next settlement seems to have been on Six Mile Prairie, in what is now Six Mile
Township. In 1811 Charles C Humphreys, grandfather of W J N Moyers the present
county judge, came from Philadelphia and settled on this prairie. His nearest
neighbor was then twelve miles away. In 1812 he kept a ferry across Big Muddy,
above the present site of Blairsville. Subsequently, on account of the hostility
of the Indians, he moved with his family to Kaskaskia and when it became safe he
returned to his farm on the prairie, where he lived until his death. He was un-
doubtedly the first settler in that portion of the county.
About the year 1818 others began to settle in that part of the county also, among
whom was Gilbert Browning, who settled on Six Mile Prairie, and Washington Campbell,
who settled on the edge thereof, and near the county line on the west. Also Samuel
Stacks, the Burnses, the Adkinses, the Kirkpatricks, Benjamin Pope, Beverly S Minor,
Solomon Snider, Richard Sanderfer, Jonathon Dobbs, and John Swain were among the
early settlers in that portion of the county. From 1817 to 1823 peace generally
prevailed in the county, except on Six Mile Prairie where the Indians continued to
harass and annoy the settlers, until they were ordered to leave, which they did,
but returned annually to hunt until 1832, after which they remained permanently
away.
The first settlers of Denning Township were David and John Dement, Nicholas, William
and John Gassaway, S M Hubbard (father of George T Hubbard, of Benton), Anderson P
Farris, Dyer Adams, James A Deason, Dudley W Duncan, Isaac Barber, John and James
Dillard and Moses M Rawling.
The early settlers of Frankfort Township were Moses Garrett, Elijah Ewing and Thomas
Roberts, who entered their lands in 1814, and William Farris, John Wren, John Crawford,
Joshua Ewing and Ben Rogers, who entered their lands in 1816-17. All of these persons
probably settled several years previous to the entry of their lands at the land
office. Other early settlers were Meshack Morris, Edward H Ridgway, W S Duncan,
Solomon and John Clark, Jeremiah Neal, Welden Manning (Weldon Manion), Tilmmon B
Cantrell, Cap A J Ice, Noah Avery, Margaret Towns and Mrs. Judge Osteen.
The settlement of Eastern Township took place soon after the Jordan settlement was
established, and some of its early settlers were William Neil, James, John and William
M
Akin, John and Robert McLane (McLean), and the following at the dates annexed to
their names, to wit: William B Dillon, 1820; James Summers, 1822; Rev Ananias
Elkins, about 1820; Christopher Ing, 1829; Rev Braxton Parrish, 1821; and Elijah
Estes, 1818 - the latter two coming from the Duck River country in Tennessee.
Herron Taylor and his wife, with their family of nine sons and one daughter, came
from Wilson County, Tenn, in 1815, and settled in what is now Northern Township.
Mr Taylor was the father of Elisha Taylor, who was the father of Isham C Taylor,
now a resident of Benton. Lazarus and Eli Webb came from the Duck River country
in Tennessee, (My note: the Webb brothers same from Warren County, KY) and settled
in that township, and entered land in 1816. About the same time Jacob Phillips,
Jacob Clark, James Allen, James A Hughes and Reuben Clark settled in that portion
of the county.
William Frizell settled in an early day on the prairie which now honors his name,
and was one of the first, if not the first settler in Ewing Township. Joseph Estes
settled in that part of the county about the same time, and John Page, in 1817.
Benjamin Smith, some of the Ewings, Walter S Aiken, Achilles D Dollins, Abraham Rea,
James Young, Michael Rawlings, Felix G Gholson, John T Knox, Daniel B Thomas, Daniel
Glover, and Martin Wooley were early settlers in Benton Township. Also Adam Clem,
in 1830; James Whittington, in 1832; and William Mooneyham, in 1848, were settlers.
Among the early settlers of Browning Township were John Hudson, Philip Brashears,
A U Harrison, and the following, with dates of settlement annexed to their names,
to wit: Carter Greenwood, 1818; Matilda Jones,1818; Joseph Teferteller, 1836.
The Mulkeys, Barzilla and Levi Silkwood, George Teferteller, William Tinsley, John
Kirkpatrick and Benjamin N Harrison were early settlers in Tyrone Township.
Baker King settled in Goode Township in 1813, and Lewis Hillin, William A Docker,
Robert M Galloway, Benjamin Goode, Adkins Greenwood, John Maccavoer and George W
Therdevant were early settlers of the northwestern part of the county.
Nathaniel B and John M Robinson, William Nicol and John Sandusky were early settlers
in Barren Township.
It will be observed that the first settlement of the county was made in the south-
eastern part thereof, and the settlements of the other localities have been given,
as nearly as possible, in the order of their dates. The northwestern portion of
the county had but few settlers until after 1830. "These settlers were all hardy
and could endure almost anything. Without any of the many appliances and inventions
to which we are now accustomed, they lived and were happy. They raised their own
flax, spun and wove it, and made it into such garments as they needed. Six yards
of cloth were considered an extravagant amount to put into one dress, which for
information of the ladies, we will say, was invariably made plain with but two widths
in the skirt, the front one cut gored. The men wore hunting shirts, with buckskin
leggins and moccasins. They had no table ware, except pewter plates, and some of
them worn through at the center; did all their cooking with a skillet and lid, using
their hunting knives at the table for all purposes." Their dwellings were rude log
cabins, with the floor made of puncheons and the roof of clapboards and the old-
fashioned open fireplace with its stick and mud chimney in one end. Their tables
and stools were made of lumber, dresssed with the ax and broad-ax, and their
bedsteads (like the "forked deer" bedsteads, as they were called in West Tennessee),
were made in the corners of the room, by the use of only one post, the house logs
furnishing a support for the other parts of the frame. On the frame thus constructed,
rough boards or puncheons were placed, and their beds made thereon. When two-story
cabins were erected, the upper room was usually reached by a ladder made of poles
and rounds, and standing in the corner or at one side of the lower room. Before
horse mills the settlers pounded their own corn into meal in a morter. The morters
were usually made by burning the center out of a large stump, until a cup or bowl
was formed, and then scraping out the charred part of the wood until it was clean.
In this the grain was pounded with a maul, which, to lessen the labor, was sometimes
suspended to a "sweep" or spring-pole.
The first horse mill in the county was erected at Jordan's Fort by Thomas Jordan
about the year 1809-10. Soon thereafter one was erected on Crawford's Prairie by
John Crawford, and another on Frizzell's Prairie by William Frizzell, and later
Jonathon Herron built a horse mill on Buckner Hill, and about 1838 John Browning
built one on his farm on Browning Hill. The first water-power mills in the county
were built in the year 1838, one on Big Muddy, at the Hillin's Ford, and another
on Middle Fork, near Macedonia. And the first steam-power mill erected by Augustus
Adams, about the year 1850, on Hickman's Branch, one and a half miles southwest
of Benton.
[History of Gallatin, Saline, Hamilton, Franklin and Williamson Counties, Illinois - 1887]
Submitted by: Sheila Cadwalader
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