General John Tipton’s Fort Wayne Connection

(Fort Wayne Monthly “Along the Heritage Trail with Tom Castaldi” – Oct 2016 No 141)

2016 Indiana Bicentennial Commission Legacy Endorsed Project

General John Tipton’s Fort Wayne Connection

Jonathan Jennings the first elected Governor of Indiana was responsible for naming commissioners to resolve the demands of government. The man who would eventually come to Allen County as Indian Agent, John Tipton, was a popular choice for several such assignments.  Just four years after statehood was achieved in January 1820, Tipton was named to a ten member commission to select and locate a site for a state capital.  Ultimately the Commission chose Indianapolis over Strawtown. 

On April 3, 1821, Jennings again tapped John Tipton for commission duty.  Now it was to locate the boundary line between Indiana and the new state of Illinois which was established in 1818.  Surveying meant plodding through unbroken country in the days before satellite technology offered its challenges.  M.W. Pershing, author of Life of General John Tipton published an interesting supposition: “But for an error made by the surveyor, who failed to establish a true meridian, the great city of Chicago would today be in the State of Indiana, instead of in the State of Illinois.”  Had the surveyor not made an error, would Chicago today be placed within Indiana as a city?  Pershing concluded that the surveyor’s notes held a stronger influence over Tipton’s insistence and Chicago stayed with Illinois.  

The notion that Chicago might be included within Indiana may have another interpretation.  Historian Will Ball’s account, taken from The Tipton Papers, delineates the field notes made during the boundary surveys. In 1834, Micajah T. Williams resurveyed the 1821 completed boundary line project and found no changes necessary.  In a moment of conjecture, Ball wrote that some years later when a member of the U.S. Senate, Tipton agitated for a harbor at the mouth of Trail Creek and not at the mouth of the Chicago River, both empting into Lake Michigan. Historian Will Ball contends, “If (Tipton’s) proposal had carried, Chicago today would be in Indiana where Michigan City now stands.”

 Well documented is another explanation to be considered and can be found in the pages of Indiana Boundaries edited by Dorothy Riker.  Illinois upon receiving the survey objected to the report since it did not fix any starting point at the site of Vincennes.  Stating that he was aware of their concern, Tipton confirmed that he had given Illinois an advantage since he was, “fearful he might injure his political standing by stating the fact in the Report and the Field Book, refused to make any other return.” On February 17, 1823, confirmation of both the Illinois and Indiana Assemblies approved the line.

In 1823, John Tipton by appointment of President Monroe, was made Indian Agent and assigned to Fort Wayne. General Tipton has even been credited with suggesting the name for Allen County to honor Colonel John Allen of the Kentucky Militia who lost his life at the Battle of River Raisin in Michigan.  Indian Agent Tipton was then assigned another important task. At the 1826 Treaty of Paradise Springs, now present-day Wabash, Indiana, the President appointed Tipton, Lewis Cass and Governor John B. Ray to negotiate with the Miami and Potawatomi.

In 1828, Tipton relocated the agency moving it to Logansport where Indian tribes received annuity payments resulting from treaties. He argued that the tribes would be better served if the agency moved away from the white traders.

After the Indian Removal Act of 1830 was passed, and the day came in 1838 for the Potawatomi to relocate to the lands set aside west of the Mississippi, tribe members resented having to make the move. It became such a serious resistance that Governor Wallace sent in soldiers to persuade the Indians to begin their move west. The Governor called on General Tipton to carry out the unfortunate mission and the oppressed, dejected, and humiliated Indians were forced to leave their beloved home land.

John Tipton was a man of many experiences packed into a relatively few years. He died in 1839 at the age of fifty-three and is buried in Logansport’s Mount Hope Cemetery.

Allen County Historian Tom Castaldi is author of the Wabash & Erie Canal Notebook series; hosts “On the Heritage Trail,” which is broadcast. Mondays on WBOI, 89.1 FM; and “Historia Nostra” heard on Redeemer Radio 106.3 FM.  Enjoy his previously published columns on the History Center’s blog, “Our Stories,” at history centerfw.blogspot.com and “Blogging Hoosier History” at Indiana Historical Bureau’s blog.history.in.gov.

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Locating a Capitol City for Indiana

(Fort Wayne Monthly “Along the Heritage Trail with Tom Castaldi” – Sept. 2016 No 140)

2016 Indiana Bicentennial Commission Legacy Endorsed Project

Locating a Capitol City for Indiana

In 1816, when Indiana entered the Union, Corydon was designated as the first state capital.  In those early Territory days, pioneer settlers had clustered together on the lands in proximity with the Ohio River. An Indiana Assembly had petitioned Congress for statehood in 1811, but its appeal was not approved. The want-to-be state of Indiana registered a meager 24,520 population in the 1810 census. Northwest Territory guidelines required a population of 60,000 before a territory qualified for adopting a constitution and joining the Union. 

 Jonathan Jennings, the territorial delegate was a central political figure of the Indiana Territory since 1809 and a significant player in the movement for statehood.  He was from Charleston near New Albany, Indiana.  Jennings was the successor of William Henry Harrison, across the state to the west who had set Vincennes as the seat of the Indiana Territory.  Corydon had a geographical advantage being situated at the near center to the south at the bottom of the Territorial border.

A second request for statehood was made in 1815 as Indiana’s population had increased to 63,897 moving Congress to pass an enabling act in April 1816 and called for a constitutional convention.  The convention took place the following June at Corydon conveniently located for those who travelled to the event. Indiana was well on its way to join Vermont, Kentucky, Tennessee, Ohio and Louisiana following the original thirteen United States.

After Indiana was admitted, the governor appointed a ten-member Commission to select and locate a site for a new state capitol.  Among the Commissioners named was John Tipton who later served as the Indian Agent at Fort Wayne.  Several towns petitioned for the honor and each location was visited by the Commissioners.  Some of the sites included Vincennes, Corydon, Madison, Terre Haute, Strawtown and Indianapolis. 

Locations were narrowed down to the wooded area near the junction of Fall Creek and the White River.  The other finalist according to M.W. Pershing’s biography of John Tipton was Strawtown. The influential William Conner strongly supported Strawtown, however, Tipton was favorable to Indianapolis, “and to head off further discussion and delay, he made a motion that Indianapolis be made the site of the new capital.” When the vote was cast and counted, Indianapolis positioned at the center of the state was selected.

History writer Alan McPherson reminds us that the name Indianapolis is derived from “Indian” attached to “polis” the Greek word for city. The name Marion was chosen for the county to celebrate Brigadier General Francis Marion known as the “Swamp Fox” and hero of the Revolutionary War.  By 1824 the legislature authorized building a temporary structure to serve as a courthouse enabling State Treasurer Samuel Morrill to move the records from Corydon to the new location.  In January 1821, the legislators first met there and by 1835 a new capital building was erected.

Having lived in northern Indiana as a lifelong Hoosier, it is not uncommon to have heard the lamenting that our state capital is at such a distance to travel.  In 1998 while serving on the project team charged with planning a new Indiana State Museum building the question of where it should be located was laid on the table for a vote. Where else should it go? North central at Logansport or Peru is too far north for the people to travel living in Evansville, Tell City or Madison.  Place it in Bloomington or Columbus and it’s too distant from Fort Wayne, South Bend or Gary. Back in 1821, the Commission, charged with locating the seat of government found Indianapolis geographically offers a greater, if not more equitable, access to most Hoosiers. When Indiana gained statehood, her population was concentrated across southern reaches of the state.  As a capital, centrally placed Indianapolis is as practical for today’s Hoosiers as was the southern community of Corydon back in 1816.

Allen County Historian Tom Castaldi is author of the Wabash & Erie Canal Notebook series; hosts “On the Heritage Trail,” which is broadcast. Mondays on WBOI, 89.1 FM; and “Historia Nostra” heard on Redeemer Radio 106.3 FM. Enjoy his previously published columns on the History Center’s blog, “Our Stories,” at history centerfw.blogspot.com. and “Blogging Hoosier History” at Indiana Historical Bureau’s blog.history.in.gov.

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Indian Agents a Factor in Early Fort Wayne

(Fort Wayne Monthly “Along the Heritage Trail with Tom Castaldi” – Aug 2016 No 139)

2016 Indiana Bicentennial Commission Legacy Endorsed Project

Indian Agents a Factor in Early Fort Wayne

In the years leading up to the time Indiana advanced to statehood, the U.S. Government was represented by Indian Agents and Factors.  The Factor or Factory was the government representative for financial and commercial matters leaving the political affairs to the Indian Agent.  However, the functions oftentimes overlapped, and the titles used indiscriminately.  Eventually, the terms “Factory” and “Factor” were nearly replaced with “Agency” and “Agent” and intended to be helpful to the Indian people by providing an appointed representative for the native population living on the Wabash-Maumee frontier.  

Who were these first players who took on this responsibility? A list of those who served in that capacity in Fort Wayne from 1798 through 1828 can be found in The Tipton Papers.  Here is a short description of some of the agents.

William Wells (serving 1798 to 1809) as a boy, was captured along the Ohio River by the Miami who adopted and assimilated him into their tribe. Married to Little Turtle’s daughter, Wells became a confidant of the great War Chief. He died at the relief of Fort Dearborn in 1812. To honor his remarkable service to his country, congress gave him the right to pre-emption of lands that today comprise Fort Wayne’s Bloomingdale and Spy Run neighborhoods known as “Wells Pre-emption.”

John Johnston (1802-1811) had been appointed Indian Factor or Factory in 1802 as the government representative for financial and commercial matters, leaving the political affairs to the Indian Agent. He did, however, succeed Wells as Agent.  Today, the Johnston Farm at Pique, Ohio, is celebrated as a tourist attraction and recalls the life of Johnston.  It was Col. Johnston’s place which provided a safe haven for the women and children who had escaped the dangers surrounding the siege of Fort Wayne.

Benjamin F. Stickney (1811-1819) the grand nephew of Ben Franklin took charge as both Factor and Agent in 1811 and was at Fort Wayne when Indiana became a state in 1816.  In 1820, Stickney was reassigned to Toledo, Ohio and became involved in the Ohio-Michigan border dispute. It was a time when both the state of Ohio and the-then Michigan Territory fought over a ten-mile strip of land. Each hoped for control over the Wabash & Erie Canal’s connection with Lake Erie before Ohio finally won the argument.

Dr. William Turner (1819–1820) arrived from Maryland and was first stationed at Fort Wayne as the garrison surgeon’s mate from 1810 to 1812. He became surgeon of the Seventeenth Infantry in 1813.  He resigned from the army in 1815 and married Anne Wells the daughter of William Wells.  In 1819, he became Indian Agent but as historian Griswold noted that due to failing health, Dr. Turner was relieved of his duties and his office turned over to John Hays. Turner died in Fort Wayne in 1821.

John Hay (1820–1831) born in New York City in 1770 gained experience as a trading house clerk dealing with the Indians in Canada.  He moved to Cahokia and was sheriff of St. Clair County and postmaster during the years 1798 to 1818. At Fort Wayne he took over for Dr. Turner at a salary of $1,200 per year. After his service at Fort Wayne he became Receiver of Public Moneys in Jackson, Missouri. His last days were said to have been spent in Cahokia.

John Tipton (1823- 1831) was born in Tennessee, in 1756 and moved to Indiana with his widowed mother. As an adult he served at the Battle of Tippecanoe eventually rising to the rank of Brigadier General. He served as a U.S. Senator but while in the Indiana legislature was a member of the commission that selected the first state capital at Corydon. Acting to separate the Indians receiving government annuities from the traders, Tipton moved the agency to Logansport in 1828.

For thirty years Fort Wayne was the center of the Indian Agent / Factor. Some were better known to history than others, however, they were on the ground to handle the furs brought in by the Indian people as well as for shipments to the East, dispensing annuity payments paid to the Indians, and financed land purchases.  Later perhaps in other places, others were on hand following Federal government orders and participated in the unfortunate removal of these same Indian charges forcibly removed from their traditional homeland to reservations in the West.

Allen County Historian Tom Castaldi is author of the Wabash & Erie Canal Notebook series; hosts “On the Heritage Trail,” which is broadcast. Mondays on WBOI, 89.1 FM; and “Historia Nostra” heard on Redeemer Radio 106.3 FM. Enjoy his previously published columns on the History Center’s blog, “Our Stories,” at history centerfw.blogspot.com.

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War of 1812 Cannon

(Fort Wayne Monthly “Along the Heritage Trail with Tom Castaldi” – July 2016 No 138)

2016 Indiana Bicentennial Commission Legacy Endorsed Project

War of 1812 Cannon

The War of 1812 was touched off over two-hundred years ago and raged on until it ended in 1814 when the American militia, “took a little trip down the Mississip.” Students learn that although the Treaty of Ghent was signed on December 24, 1814, the news had not reached General Andrew Jackson nor had his British adversary General Pakenham both of whom were still at it in New Orleans until January 8, 1815. Much happened in the war which finally forced England to recognize the United States as a sovereign nation. Students also learn if they dig deeply they find the garrison at Fort Wayne was part of the great saga.  William Henry Harrison’s army put a halt to the siege of the fort during October 1812.  When the war was over and a treaty agreement signed, hope for peace reigned once again.

Among the fallout of the great events in history come stories and myths. One of the spoils of that war was a cannon taken by U. S. Commodore Perry’s men as a prize. It is presumed so from reading through the stories related by twentieth-century history writers. According to the Fort Wayne Daily News of February 22, 1913, “The cannon is a relic of the war of 1812, and was captured by Commodore Perry in the Battle of Lake Erie.  It was taken to Detroit with a great many other pieces of stolen arms, and for years was stored away, untouched and forgotten. When the late Hon. Franklin P. Randall was mayor of Fort Wayne, he heard of the cannon, and sent for one of them.”  It is important to note that Randall was elected Mayor in 1859 then reelected in the elections held in 1861, 1863, 1869 and 1871.

In their 1914 Guide to Fort Wayne, B.J. Griswold and C.A. Phelps made the claim that the cannon was captured from the British before taken to Detroit.  Mayor Randall secured the artifact and had it placed on the Court House lawn. Other claims say that for a time the old cannon was used for firing salutes on July Fourth celebrations. It is alleged, that on one such occasion, after firing the cannon a man was accidentally killed and another injured. The gun was “spiked” and removed to the mayor’s house on Berry Street to be used as an ornamental hitching post. 

In 1916 the big gun was dedicated as “Commodore Perry Monument.”  By 1952 it was mounted in Hayden Park and in 1960 was placed with the Historical Society when that organization’s museum was located in Swinney Park on West Jefferson Street; and later removed the old piece to the entrance of the Historic Fort Wayne’s ticketing and gift shop.  It is now on display in the History Center Museum.

It 1960 it was described as the, “Six pounder naval gun, relic of Battle of Lake Erie 1813, used in dedication of Wabash and Eire Canal July 4, 1843. Gun carriage authentic replica made from old canal timbers 1960.”  A “Six pounder” meant that the ball it fired weighed six pounds. 

Cannon firings were reported to have been a part of both July Fourth and canal opening celebration days.  Typical stories passed along say a cannon was on the first Wabash & Erie Canal boat that traveled from Fort Wayne to Huntington, on July 4th and 5th 1835.  One traveler, Dr. George Fate, carried one with him firing it from time to time. Such an incident in 1835 is too early for this to be the 1812 Perry Cannon.  That big gun it did not make an appearance in Fort Wayne until Mayor Randall is said to have acquired it during the 1860s.  For the same reason, it is doubtful that the claim that “a cannon – a souvenir from one of the British vessels captured in Perry’s victory in 1813 – boomed a noisy greeting” when the Great Canal Celebration took place in Fort Wayne on July 4, 1843.  Nonetheless, the Commodore Perry cannon remains in Fort Wayne and can be seen resting peacefully on display in the atrium of the History Center.

Allen County Historian Tom Castaldi is author of the Wabash & Erie Canal Notebook series; hosts “On the Heritage Trail,” which is broadcast. Mondays on WBOI, 89.1 FM; and “Historia Nostra” heard on Redeemer Radio 106.3 FM. Enjoy his previously published columns on the History Center’s blog, “Our Stories,” at history centerfw.blogspot.com.

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The Boss Roaster

  (Fort Wayne Monthly “Along the Heritage Trail with Tom Castaldi” - Nov 2013  No. 107)

The Boss Roaster     

Each year as Thanksgiving and Christmas celebration plans begin to emerge, images of families gathering around a table come to mind as each awaits the bird roasting in the oven to be set before them.  So much for the shades of long ago memories, so how did the images that were a reality for our grand and great grand parents materialize?  Early on, they may not have had the precision control we enjoy today with a gas-fired or an electric oven because they had to deal with a traditional wood-fired stove.  Be that as it may, the kitchen of the late 1800s and early 1900s did have access to some of the latest cooking technology available from Fort Wayne.

A book at the Allen County Fort Wayne History Center titled, The Industrial Advantages of Fort Wayne, Ind., features material development and progress back in the days of 1895 when it was published.  How many of us remember or even knew about the Boss Roaster Manufacturing Co., headquartered at 372 South Calhoun Street? Proprietors Daniel Klotz and Gottlieb Haller who produced the product started the company in March 1891.

Among the descriptive sketches of the company one declared, “The most important improvement ever introduced in culinary apparatus is the “Boss Roaster.” So what was the “Boss Roaster”? It was made in several sizes of strong and durable sheet metal as well as adaptable and easy to understand its use in all types of ovens.  An oblong pan, with what was claimed to have an airtight cover, prevented steam from escaping thus preserving all the “juices and nutrition qualities of the meats and other articles of food being cooked.” It was designed for the cook to be able to check the contents of the roaster by simply pulling out the sliding lid.  Meat could be browned to a desired color controlled by removing its ventilator at the top shortly before serving time.

Other than roasting meats, the Boss was said to be equally useful for baking bread, biscuits, pies, cakes or for roasting apples, potatoes and vegetables, and for steaming fruits. Some ten thousand roasters had been sold in Fort Wayne alone.

Because it was promoted as “the simplest, the best and the cheapest utensil of the kind on the market… thousands of them are in use for general cooking purposes and giving the utmost satisfaction in all cases.”  Best of all “they sell on sight”, and the company was seeking to have “agents in every town and city in the United States.” Opportunities for an exclusive right of territory with the assurances that, “protection against other agents guaranteed.”  In 1895, the offer was made that, “Any industrious man or woman can secure a profitable income by requesting this company in any part of the union.”

If the household cook had to deal with the inefficiencies of those early wood-fired cooking stoves, it is gratifying to know that the latest in accouterments of culinary was available to ease the burden.  Whose to say how many kitchens had the Boss Roaster from Fort Wayne tucked away in its cupboard and responsible for so many memorable meals?

Allen County Historian Tom Castaldi is author of the Wabash & Erie Canal Notebook series; hosts “On the Heritage Trail,” which is broadcast. Mondays on WBOI, 89.1 FM; and “Historia Nostra” heard on Redeemer Radio 106.3 FM.  Enjoy his previously published columns on the History Center’s blog, “Our Stories,” at history centerfw.blogspot.com and “Blogging Hoosier History” at Indiana Historical Bureau’s blog.history.in.gov.

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Laying out the Town after Statehood in 1816

(Fort Wayne Monthly “Along the Heritage Trail with Tom Castaldi” – Jun 2016 No 137)

2016 Indiana Bicentennial Commission Legacy Endorsed Project

Laying out the Town after Statehood in 1816

You can say that Fort Wayne is here because of its rivers.  The Miami War Chief Little Turtle recalled that it was from here the words of their fathers went forth in all the directions.  Anthony Wayne placing his fortress near water was a strategic decision.  Positioned to protect and defend three rivers was perhaps of primary importance.   Just as vital was another popular waterway of sorts that connected Lake Erie, between the Maumee River and across the “natural” track or “Carrying Place” with the Wabash River Valley to the west and the Mississippi River system.

John Barr and John McCorkle, combined their resources in 1823 to buy the original tract of one hundred and ten acres. Barr was a land speculator from Baltimore, Maryland, who was heavily involved in supplying trade goods to the Ohio and Pennsylvania frontier.  McCorkle was a Westerner interested in the business of the Indian trade. Once the land was purchased, the two partners had their new property surveyed and laid out to begin offering lots for sale to the public. 

Originally, the partners paid twenty-six dollars an acre which was a very high price for the time. Most frontier lands were sold for the minimum of a dollar and twenty-five cents per acre. As always it had to do with location, location, location. Much had to do with the presence of Indians, the Indian Agency, and the very lucrative fur trade. In those years, the Fort Wayne fur trade was greater than the combined trade of both Detroit and Chicago and the Indian Agency made annual payments of tens of thousands of dollars to over three thousand tribe members who held the lands of northern Indiana.

The original layout of the town of Fort Wayne was based on the “natural” track of the first street, Columbia, which was along a line that ran toward the west from the old fort but not along a true east-west line.  When they first laid out their streets they were based on the off-center line of the original Columbia Street which, not long after became known as the “Landing.” Along here is where scores of warehouses, boat docks, turnaround basins, custom houses, inns and taverns clustered to serve Wabash Erie Canal travelers and freight which created unprecedented economic development.

The area that is now in the heart of Fort Wayne’s downtown was bounded on the north by Superior Street, on the east by Barr Street, on the south by Washington Boulevard, and on the west by the alley between Harrison and Calhoun streets. Extending to Wayne on the South it is bisected by Clinton crossed by Wayne, Berry, Main and Columbia.

A map of the early Fort Wayne plat in the History Center’s collection contains interesting information. First among the map’s “Notes” which correspond to a block on the map bound by Main, Clinton, Berry and Calhoun streets is designated, “Public Ground for County Purposes.” It had been donated by McCorkle and Barr and subsequently became the site of each of four county court houses.  The partners donated several additional lots to the, “County of Allen.” Separately, a lot was set aside designated as “Burial Grounds” in the northwest corner of the plat and immediately to the east still another marked “School lot.”

South of town, Samuel Lewis became the first settler to lay out his addition according to the actual points of the compass.  In the process he gave his name to the true east-west street which sets it all straight.  Lewis was a relative of Meriwether Lewis, of “Lewis and Clark” fame; and his wife, Katherine Wallace was the aunt of the author of the novel Ben Hur, General Lew Wallace who stayed at the couple’s rose-covered log home on several occasions.  Samuel Lewis came to Fort Wayne in 1827 as the appointee of President John Quincy Adams to be the sub-agent for Indian affairs in the district.  Lewis stayed in Fort Wayne the remainder of his life. 

When those first developers laid out the streets of Fort Wayne, based on the off-center line of the original Columbia Street it made sense that it ran west from the old fort.  Today, main thoroughfares move traffic in all directions echoing the observations made in 1795 by the Miami War Chief Little Turtle when he said this place was, “that glorious gate…through which all the good words of our chiefs had to pass from north to south and from east to west.”  

Allen County Historian Tom Castaldi is author of the Wabash & Erie Canal Notebook series; hosts “On the Heritage Trail,” which is broadcast. Mondays on WBOI, 89.1 FM; and “Historia Nostra” heard on Redeemer Radio 106.3 FM. Enjoy his previously published columns on the History Center’s blog, “Our Stories,” at history centerfw.blogspot.com.

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Allen County in 1816?

(Fort Wayne Monthly “Along the Heritage Trail with Tom Castaldi” – May 2016 No. 136)

2016 Indiana Bicentennial Commission Legacy Endorsed Project

Allen County in 1816?

When Indiana first was admitted to the Union, legislators convened an assembly in the first state capital located at Corydon.  Allen County was created seven years after Indiana statehood.  The Indiana General assembly made it official by passing an enabling act on December 17, 1823.  It chose to honor the name of Colonel John Allen of the Kentucky militia who was on hand to defend Fort Wayne while the garrison was under siege by the Indians in 1812.  Allen died near present-day Monroe, Michigan at the River Raisin massacre in 1813, made historically significant among other events having taken the life of the Shawnee brave Tecumseh.

Another recognized name that has come down through history emanates from Alexander Ewing. He was an Irish immigrant who came to Fort Wayne from Detroit in 1822 and erected a tavern known as Washington House. It stood at the corner of present-day Fort Wayne’s Barr and Columbia streets, now marked in Freimann Square west of the Arts United Center.  Here is where Allen County was officially organized and the first acts of the newly elected county commissioners were carried out. It was here too that Ewing was elected to the Board of Justices of the Peace and was appointed to serve on the first grand jury.

Fort Wayne was not always the seat of county justice in the strict sense.  George Pence and Nellie Armstrong point out in Indiana Boundaries it is because the first counties established in the Northwest Territory that became Indiana were formed by the decree of governors of the Northwest and Indiana territories, however by 1805 the Indiana Territory had advanced to a level that empowered the creating of counties to the legislature.  Before establishing a county three concerns faced the decision makers: providing adequate local jurisdiction in large counties where the citizens were separated by great distances and geographical terrain; the spread of population after the native tribes ceded the lands after the 1812 War; and finally with the emergence of towns, competition sprang up for the prestige and economic advantages which came with being named a county seat.

When Indiana was first accepted into the United States of America in 1816 Allen County had not been established. The territorial legislature already had created Knox County with its seat of government in Vincennes. A series of events that led to an Allen County appears in Historical Atlas and Chronology of County Boundaries (1984) edited by John H. Long.  On June 20, 1790, Knox County encompassed all of the area of today’s Indiana plus portions of modern Illinois, Michigan, Ohio and Wisconsin. By 1795 Randolph County was organized as part of the Northwest Territory with its seat at Kaskaskia largely because it was formed from St. Clair County which covered the area of modern Illinois. When Indiana Territory was authorized in 1800, covering Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin and parts of Michigan and Minnesota, the new Territory consisted of Knox, Randolph and St. Clair counties.

As time passed the boundaries of the counties changed and new counties established. In 1818 the U.S Government obtained a treaty with several tribes known to the history of the Middle West as the “Delaware New Purchase.” An 1816 edition of The New Purchase, Robert Carlton described it as “…nearly all the land east and south of the Wabash not previously relinquished by the Indians.” Out of this land thirty-seven new counties were made one of which was dubbed Randolph.  It was from this “Delaware New Purchase” that Allen County was created on April 1, 1824, with the county seat at Fort Wayne.

  If anyone asked the name of this Fort Wayne-based county, you could say once we were in Knox and then it was changed to Randolph. Now Fort Wayne serves as the seat of Allen County named for the Colonel from Kentucky the courageous soldier John Allen who lost his life at the Battle of River Raisin.  

Allen County Historian Tom Castaldi is author of the Wabash & Erie Canal Notebook series; hosts “On the Heritage Trail,” which is broadcast. Mondays on WBOI, 89.1 FM; and “Historia Nostra” heard on Redeemer Radio 106.3 FM. Enjoy his previously published columns on the History Center’s blog, “Our Stories,” at history centerfw.blogspot.com.

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Internal Improvements Come to Fort Wayne - 1816

(Fort Wayne Monthly “Along the Heritage Trail with Tom Castaldi” – April 2016 No 135)

2016 Indiana Bicentennial Commission Legacy Endorsed Project

Internal Improvements Come to Fort Wayne - 1816

When Indiana was admitted to the Union, legislators convened an assembly in the first state capital located in Corydon.  Among the earliest issues to be taken up was a plan of internal improvements for Indiana. As early as in his 1817 message to the Indiana General Assembly, new Governor Jonathan Jennings pressed for prompt attention to be given a canal to connect the Maumee and Wabash rivers separated by the old portage.  It soon brought a focus to Fort Wayne which was to become the seat of the Wabash and Erie Canal.

During 1816, Robert McKfee wrote about the time he witnessed the events of the War of 1812 in The History of the Late War in the Western Country wrote, “The Miami (Maumee River) is navigable for boats from this place to the Lake (i.e…Lake Erie), and the portage to the nearest navigable branch of the Wabash, is but seven or eight miles, through a level marshy prairie, for which the water runs both to the Wabash and St. Mary’s.  A canal at some future day will unite these rivers, and thus render the town at Fort Wayne, as formerly, the most considerable place in all that country.”  

 Later in his congratulatory letter of June 17, 1843 when the grand opening of the Canal between Toledo on Lake Erie and Lafayette on the Wabash was to take place the following July 4th wrote, “I now find that prediction realized in a much shorter time than was expected.  Fort Wayne must, of necessity, increase in its population and prosperity; and, in a few years, it must take rank among the proudest of our inland cities.”

People in Fort Wayne were excited about the prospect that the new State’s status would soon rise to a new level of importance. Further, citizens found the idea of a canal crossing a land barrier to connect the Maumee and Wabash rivers would at long last replace the ancient portage.    In his message to the Indiana Legislature Governor Jonathan Jennings pushed for the proposal of joining the Maumee and Wabash with a waterway.

Benjamin F. Stickney the Indiana agent stationed at Fort Wayne sent off a letter to Governor DeWitt Clinton whose support for New York’s canal became known as the “Father” of the Erie Canal.  In the letter Stickney described the proposed canal coming to Fort Wayne. The governor, who had directed the completion of the Erie Canal between Lake Erie with the Hudson River replied, “I have found a way to get into Lake Erie, and you have shown me how to get out of it.  You have extended my project six hundred miles.”

  Although excitement ran high for canals, such projects were not without the risk of failure. As early as 1805, the Territorial legislature chartered the Indiana Canal Company. Its purpose was to dig a passage around the Falls of the Ohio River at present-day Jeffersonville, Indiana.  Hoverer, the project was delayed and revived in 1817 and again in 1820 but it came to naught.  Kentucky took up the cause and successfully constructed the short bypass around the falls on the south bank of the Ohio River. By 1829, the Louisville and Portland Canal was completed.

In 1832, ground was broken for the Wabash Erie Canal in Fort Wayne, opened in 1835 to Huntington, Indiana and by 1843 it was operational between Lafayette, Indiana and Toledo, Ohio with Fort Wayne resting on the highest elevation between the two. Eventually, it earned Fort Wayne the name of The Summit City.   That future day noted by McKee in 1816 came to pass in 1853 when the Wabash and Erie reached Evansville.   Not only was the Maumee and Wabash rivers connected, but Lake Erie was finally connected with the Oho River.

Allen County Historian Tom Castaldi is author of the Wabash & Erie Canal Notebook series; hosts “On the Heritage Trail,” which is broadcast. Mondays on WBOI, 89.1 FM; and “Historia Nostra” heard on Redeemer Radio 106.3 FM. Enjoy his previously published columns on the History Center’s blog, “Our Stories,” at history centerfw.blogspot.com.

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Fort Wayne Allen Co in 1816

(Fort Wayne Monthly “Along the Heritage Trail with Tom Castaldi” – Mar 2016 No 134)

2016 Indiana Bicentennial Commission Legacy Endorsed Project

Fort Wayne Allen Co in 1816

By an Act of Congress on May 7, 1800 the American region north and west of the Ohio River was established as the Northwest Territory.  All land west of a north south line extending from the mouth of the Kentucky River through Fort Recovery (Ohio) and on up into Canada was dubbed the Indiana Territory.  After Ohio was admitted as a State in 1802, the line of what set its northern boundary was directly east from the southern point of Lake Michigan and was added to the Indiana Territory. Later in 1805, most of what we know as the State of Michigan was given the name Michigan Territory. The Illinois Territory was established in 1809. Indiana entered the Union as a State on December 11, 1816, when the town at the stronghold of Fort Wayne was celebrating its twenty-second birthday.

In a letter dated June 17, 1843, recalling his witnessing of the 1812 Siege of Fort Wayne, Captain McAfee described the community when he stated, “My recollection of the condition in which we found that place in September, 1812, when General Harrison’s army relieved it from the attacks of the Indians who had burnt and plundered every house outside of the fort, are yet fresh in my mind.”

Fort Wayne’s Commandant Major Whistler was transferred to Saint Louis in 1816 and replaced by Major Josiah N. Vose of the Fifth U.S. infantry.  Major Vose command consisted of a garrison of some fifty-six men. Among his first efforts was replacing the council house which had been burned during the Siege of 1812 when William Henry Harrison’s Army came to the rescue of Fort Wayne.  A two-story log structure, the council house stood on present-day East Main Street near the fire station and served the community.  For some time, the structure was used for a school and later repurposed as a residence for the noted pioneers Michael Hedekin and Louis T. Bourie

Josiah Vose had been commissioned a captain in the Twenty-first infantry in time for the War of 1812. During that conflict he was promoted to Major, the rank he enjoyed when assigned to the Fort Wayne post. Later in 1842 he earned the level of Colonel while commanding troops during the Second Seminole War. 

Historian Bert Griswold recorded a description of Vose quoting from a letter written in 1859 by Colonel John Johnston who had once served as Indian Agent at the Three Rivers:  “Major Vose was the only commandant of the fort who publicly professed Christianity. It was his constant practice ‘to assemble his men on the Sabbath day and read the Scriptures to them and talk with them in a conversational way about religion. The conduct of such a man can only be appreciated by persons familiar with the allurements and temptations of military life.’”

Change came to Fort Wayne in the year 1819 with the departure of the troops and the abandonment of the fort as a military stronghold. It was on April 19, that Vose and his men climbed into dugout pirogues on the Maumee River heading to a new assignment in Detroit with the heavy armament in tow.

 Left behind in Fort Wayne were four vacated buildings which were taken over by civil authorities represented by Indian Agent Major Stickney.  Griswold wrote: Even at this period, the shelter of the stockade brought a feeling of security, and the fort was not without its convenient firearms and supply of ammunition. The provision of these comfortable living quarters served also to attract many travelers, some of whom remained to stamp their names and characters upon the history of the village and the town.”

Allen County Historian Tom Castaldi is author of the Wabash & Erie Canal Notebook series; hosts “On the Heritage Trail,” which is broadcast. Mondays on WBOI, 89.1 FM; and “Historia Nostra” heard on Redeemer Radio 106.3 FM. Enjoy his previously published columns on the History Center’s blog, “Our Stories,” at history centerfw.blogspot.com.

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Who’s a Hoosier?

 (“Along the Heritage Trail with Tom Castaldi” – February 2016, No. 133)

Who’s a Hoosier?

How many times has some one from Indiana been asked, what is a Hoosier?  Not the nickname for a state university, but that seemingly indefinable term Indianans have been branded. One survey seeking the solution produced a list of thirty-eight possible explanations. 

A 1995, Indiana Magazine of History published by Fisk University History Professor William D. Pierson’s gave his take on the issue.  In 1848, John Bartlett suggested in the Dictionary of Americanisms that “Hoosier” was a term that started way down in New Orleans coming from a word spelled “Husher” a rough and tumble sort not to be crossed.  Since there was no evidence for “Husher” it had been dismissed.

Bartlett presents the notion that maybe it was “who’s yere” the reply a stranger heard after a knock on the door of remote settler’s cabin.  Although popular as a definition it did not line up with how some one would approach their arrival of the day.  Then came the suggestion of “hussar” since some thought it a corruption of a European term to honor the fighting spirit of river boatmen. Or, perhaps it came about because the boatmen who enjoyed leaping into the air and bellowing “huzza,” Both have not been taken too seriously by historians as the source of the term.

Historian Jacob Piatt Dunn noted a similar word, “hoozeer” for “anything unusually large,” believed that the expression “Hoosier” could be explained standing a test of three common attributes.  It must apply to a rough class of people. It came from the South. It was created to designate Indiana people.  Dunn’s third test had to be eliminated since the word existed before it was used in reference to one from Indiana, however, it was intended to denigrate as well having come up from the South.  As early as 1833 the Indianapolis Journal published John Finley’s poem titled, “The Hoosier’s Nest.”  Dunn was even able to trace the word from southern Virginia and the Carolinas then west to Tennessee as derogatory before moving north to Indiana. 

Dunn also tracked down a rumor that a contractor for the Louisville & Portland Canal on the Ohio River named Hoosier was hiring men from Indiana who became “Hoosier Men”.  However, no such contractor was found so that idea was dropped.

A term from the 1899 edition of William Dickinson’s Dialect of Cumberland suggested a similar word “hoozer.” From the Anglo Saxton it came through Cumberland and as mentioned above meant something or somebody unusually large. However, “hoozer” was considered different from “hoosier” pronounced “hoo-zher.”

During the years “Hoosier” was finding its way on the then-frontier, there emerged a likely source.  Among the Methodist preachers was the African-American evangelist Harry Hoosier.  Born about 1750, he had gained his freedom and became a popular circuit rider among other white ministers. Hoosier was a gifted speaker and Benjamin Rush said that even though he was illiterate, “he was the greatest orator in America.” As such, the preacher said he knew only the sound of his name not the spelling.

History Professor Pierson wrote that some scholarly historians believe the term “Hoosier” was a reference to back country primitive followers of Harry Hoosier who fought for the anti-slavery position. Of all the speculation, Dunn’s suggestion of the “hoozeer” and the Harry Hoosier best qualify for the terms movement from the Appalachian frontier. Other theories depend on origins that cannot show the place and ways the word was used.

A condescending and disparaging word ‘Cracker” directed toward poor white folks in the South was displaced by “Hoosiers” in the upper regions of the South.  Even the rubes of North Carolina, Tennessee and Kentucky may have been embraced as Hoosiers, but the geographical dividing line between “Hoosier” and “Cracker” marks the southern limit of Harry Hoosier’s circuit tours.  So it remains, whose-sure with any certainty where the moniker came from is yet to be determined.

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Allen County Historian Tom Castaldi is author of the Wabash & Erie Canal Notebook series; hosts “On the Heritage Trail,” which is broadcast. Mondays on WBOI, 89.1 FM; and “Historia Nostra” heard on Redeemer Radio. Ft. Wayne 106.3 FM and South Bend 95.7 FM.  Enjoy his previously published columns on the History Center’s blog, “Our Stories,” at history centerfw.blogspot.com.

John Kinzie

 (“Along the Heritage Trail with Tom Castaldi” – December 2015, No. 131)

John Kinzie

Anyone traveling in and about Chicago is likely to encounter Kinzie Street.  John Kinzie is reputed to be the “father” of the City of Chicago having earned the title as one of its early settlers. John Kinzie once lived in Miamitown, the site of present-day Fort Wayne and at the request of Father Louis Payet stepped in to play his violin for the small Catholic community gathered in December 1789 for the Christmas Eve midnight Mass.

It was during the early 1790s a few years before the U.S. fortress was dedicated as Fort Wayne. In the journal of Henry Hay, a visitor to Miamitown from Detroit, who on February 17, 1790, wrote that the frozen rivers created ice jams which, in turn, caused the water to rise partially flooding Miamitown. To get around, folks used canoes and pirogues and by February 24th the water had surrounded John Kinzie’s house forcing him to move out.

Eight months earlier when Harmer’s army came up from Fort Washington – now the Cincinnati area – suffering a defeat at the hands of the Miami Confederation, John Kinzie was in Miamitown along with George Sharp and Antoine Lasselle. Sharp wrote to Col. Alexander McKee from Defiance on October 17, 1790, before he heard of Harmer’s loss.  “I left the Miamies the 15^th. The people in general had then saved a considerable part of their property but the village was burned to ashes by the Indians, lest it offer shelter to their enemies.  Messrs. Kinzie and Lacelle (sic) were to remain in the environs of the Miamis four days at last after my departure and promised to send me every intelligence of consequence to this place.” (

In 1792 Kinzie was described as “a Scot, who, in addition to merchandizing, followed the occupation of a silversmith, exchanging with the Indian his brooches, ear-drops, and other silver ornaments, at an enormous profit, for skins and furs.”

In 1804, Kinzie moved to Chicago, where Fort Dearborn had been constructed during the summer of 1803 making his home opposite the fort on the north bank of the Chicago River.  He was in his new town when General William Hull, governor of Michigan and commandant of the American force at Detroit, ordered Captain Nathan Heald at Fort Dearborn to abandon his command and take refuge back at Fort Wayne.  John  Kinzie also was there when William Wells and his band of Miami warriors arrived in 1812 to escort the occupants out of Fort Dearborn and return the garrison to the safety of Fort Wayne.  Among the caravan travelers were Well’s niece, Mrs. Rebekah Heald and Mrs. Margaret Helm the wife of Lt. Linai T. Helm. Mrs. Heald witnessed her uncle William Wells cut down by the mostly Potawatomi attackers as he attempted to escort some ninety-six officers, enlisted militia as well as women and children, many in covered wagons exiting the fort. American losses counted fifty-three dead along with many wounded, and about fifteen warriors were lost.

During the attack, Chief Black Partridge rescued Margaret Helm.  After the conflict the Potawatomi Black Partridge along with Waubansee, protected Mrs. Helm as well as John Kinzie’s family.   Mrs. Heald, Mrs. Helm and Sergeant Griffith, brother of Mrs. Alexander Ewing of Fort Wayne were saved through the good offices of Black Partridge, Sau-gan-ash and Topenebe. 

These were days of great importance. John Kinzie was one of the colorful characters who witnessed the struggles of the wilderness at places which grew to become the city of Fort Wayne and the mega city of Chicago.  Raids on Maimitown and the War of 1812 at Fort Dearborn – America’s second war of Independence from Great Brittan control – found John Kinzie as an eyewitness. He was at his home when he died in 1828 and is buried in Chicago, where he brought a piece of Hoosier with him to found the city of Chicago.

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Allen County Historian Tom Castaldi is author of the Wabash & Erie Canal Notebook series; hosts “On the Heritage Trail,” which is broadcast. Mondays on WBOI, 89.1 FM; and “Historia Nostra” heard on Redeemer Radio. Ft. Wayne 106.3 FM and South Bend 95.7 FM.  Enjoy his previously published columns on the History Center’s blog, “Our Stories,” at history centerfw.blogspot.com.

Lambdin P. Milligan

 (“Along the Heritage Trail with Tom Castaldi” – November 2015, No. 130)

Lambdin P. Milligan

During the American Civil War, southern sympathizers known as Copperheads, (meaning snakes) living in Indiana had joined states including Ohio, Illinois and Kentucky in what became known as the Northwest Conspiracy.  The most serious of their followers formed the Knights of the Golden Circle in 1854, which was the catalyst for the Sons of Liberty. Among this group’s leaders was Lambdin P. Milligan of Huntington County. Born in 1812, he had grown to a commanding height of six-feet four inches during which time he also developed a love for reading.  He became a lawyer and at the time of the Civil War believed it was a New England concern motivated by New England Yankees worried about making money.  He openly advocated for the doctrine of a states’ rights to separate from the Union.

Archivist Stephen E. Towne writing for Indiana Magazine of History stated that shortly after Milligan had been rejected for a gubernatorial nomination by Indiana’s Democrat Convention delegates, he was in Fort Wayne on August 13, 1864, speaking to, “a sizable minority of the party who clamored for an immediate end to the war against the Confederate states.” That fall Milligan was part of a group who planned sabotage, releasing and arming Confederate prisoners in Indianapolis and overthrowing state governments. The group was uncovered, arrested and tried for treason.

About the time the South was ready to quit the Rebellion, it was reinvigorated when learning the Sons of Liberty were planning to liberate some 40,000 Confederate prisoners of war held at Camp Douglas at Chicago and other northern locations including Camp Morton at Indianapolis. With the releasing of prisoners and seizing the arsenals at Camp Douglas and Rock Island, they planned to march the prisoners south to join up with rebel armies. Historians mention that Confederate General John Hunt Morgan’s daring raid into southern Indiana to pillage her counties was perhaps a part of the scheme intended to signal a start of the Sons of Liberty’s action.

If their plot had succeeded, the Sons of Liberty believed that they could control of the supply lines to the South thus weakening the Union's cause. Although the plan was set to take place, a spy had revealed their strategy to Indiana's Governor Oliver P. Morton.  Milligan, along with of other Sons of Liberty members were arrested and thousands of arms were seized.  Milligan, Dr. William A. Bowles of French Lick, Ind., and Stephen Horsey of Shoals, Ind., were tried by a military commission found guilty of all charges brought against them and sentenced to hang.  After Lincoln's assassination, Andrew Johnson ordered the executions to take place, but Indiana’s Governor Morton stepped in to plead for the lives of the condemned prisoners.  When the request was turned down by President Johnson, Morton appealed to the federal district court in Indianapolis and the case was sent up to the Supreme Court.

In 1866, a verdict was rendered by the High Court, known as ex parte Milligan, that the military trial of a civilian in a place where the civil courts remained open was unconstitutional.  The Court’s decision is one which protects civilians from being tried in military courts, even in time of war, if the civil courts are open and functioning. In a separate Indiana Magazine of History analysis by Peter J. Barry, Justice David Davis is quoted as saying: “When peace prevails, and the authority of the government is undisputed, there is no difficulty of preserving the safeguards of liberty…but if society is disturbed by civil commotion – if the passions of men are aroused and the restraints of law weakened, if not disregarded – these safeguards need, and should receive, the watchful care of those entrusted with the guardianship of the Constitution and laws.”

   An Indiana Historical Bureau marker stands on the west lawn of the courthouse in Huntington, Indiana, which honors the decision stating in part, “In a landmark decision on April 3, 1866, the United States Supreme Court overturned the conspiracy against the national government conviction of Huntington attorney Lambdin P. Milligan (1812-1899).”  This High Court decision guaranteed by right of the Constitution meant Milligan was able to return to continue practicing law. He died on December 21, 1899, at age eighty seven and is buried in Huntington, Indiana’s Mount Hope Cemetery.

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Allen County Historian Tom Castaldi is author of the Wabash & Erie Canal Notebook series; hosts “On the Heritage Trail,” which is broadcast. Mondays on WBOI, 89.1 FM; and “Historia Nostra” heard on Redeemer Radio106.3 FM. Enjoy his previously published columns on the History Center’s blog, “Our Stories,” at history centerfw.blogspot.com.