(Sept 26, cont). I was on my way to Section 31 in Salem Township, where I could cross the Mad River. James McPherson was said to have lived near the river there. James McPherson is the person who had lived with the Shawnee people for some time after having been captured in 1781 in the fight known as Lochry’s Defeat.

Upper Valley Pike, the sign says. The “valley” is the Mad River valley. I wasn’t almost at the River at this point, even if this doesn’t look very much like a valley. The road doesn’t look much like a pike here either, because it seems to follow half-section lines rather than following the terrain from point A to point B. But a comparison of modern maps with the 1874 county atlas suggests that the roads have been much re-worked in this place. Even the river doesn’t seem to follow the course shown on the old maps.

The intersection is circled in red on this aerial view. The river (a small creek up here) crosses the road just to the south. To me it looks like it has been straightened and re-routed.

]]> http://www.spokesrider.com/2008/11/28/upper-valley-pike/feed/ 0 http://www.spokesrider.com/2008/11/23/soybeans-got-my-attention/ http://www.spokesrider.com/2008/11/23/soybeans-got-my-attention/#comments Sun, 23 Nov 2008 09:12:16 +0000 Spokesrider http://www.spokesrider.com/2008/11/23/soybeans-got-my-attention/

(Sept. 26, cont.) This is just an old barn, less than a mile east of the esker. I like the color effect that soybeans give to the landscape when they start to dry.

I looked on the old maps and county histories to see if there was anything interesting about the people who lived here. The 1874 atlas doesn’t even show a farmstead at this location. The owner of this land is shown as E.F. Lemen. The surname Lemen also appears elsewhere on the township map, and it appears in the county history as the holder of various township offices, but I didn’t find anything other than that.

googlemap

The barn can be seen on this map, under one of the yellow pushpins.

While checking the Champaign county history for information about Lemen, I found a mention of an incident that I’ve been trying to learn more about, with not much success:

At the first session of the Supreme Court, held in 1805, the Judges were Samuel Huntington, Chief Justice, and William Sprigg and Daniel Symmes, Associate Judges. The first case tried was the State against Isaac Bracken, Archibald Dowden and Robert Rennick, for assault on an Indian named Kanawa Tuckow. The defendants pleading “not guilty,” and taking issue “for plea, put themselves upon God and their country.” The jury was composed of William McDonald, Sampson Talbott, Justus Jones, George Croft and others, and the accused were defended by Joshua Collett, who afterward was one of the Judges of the Supreme Court.

These incidents where Native peoples tried to use the American court systems have usually received attention from academics, but I haven’t been able to find much more on the Internet about this one. Another account that mostly repeats the same information says it was a case of murder, not just assault. But I haven’t learned a thing about Kanawa Tuckow — whether he was Shawnee or what. Indian names are often garbled when transcribed into written English, so I’m not surprised that a search for Kanawa Tuckow didn’t yield anything. But Bracken, Dowden, and Rennick haven’t left much trace on the Internet, either — especially the first two of these men. There is some information about Rennick in a 1922 history of Clark county — he was postmaster in Springfield at the time of the court case, and continued in that office until 1824.

I’m guessing the incident took place somewhere near the Mad River between Dayton and Springfield, but I don’t have nearly enough information to make a bike ride out of it. I suppose the court records exist somewhere. But I’m still hoping to find that someone else has gone to the trouble to check out the story and has written about it. Anyone who sees this and can tell me more about it, please do so!