History of Hillsdale county. Michigan, with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of its prominent men and pioneers.

HISTORY OF HILLSDALE COUNTY, MICHIGAN.
I

127

John Sinclair, a native of Glasgow, Scotland, settled in
Jonesville in September, 1836. Until 1843 he followed
the business of cabinet-making, then for twenty years conducted a farm; was subsequently a merchant. The following article from his pen is recorded in the archives of
the Pioneer Society:
"Becoming a resident of Jonesville in 1836, I had an
opportunity of witnessing emigration as it poured into and
through our county, the Chicago turnpike being the only
thoroughfare at that time. Along this road came the emigration that settled some of the counties of Northern Indiana, turning southward at Allen's Prairie and other
points; a line of wagons almost continuous passing through
the village daily. This was then the county-seat,-county
jail occupying the public square north side of Chicago
road. A grist-mill had been erected the year before
(1835*). An Indian trail up the valley of the St.
Joseph, branching towards Baw Beese and Sand Lakes, was
the only road south to Jonesville. The first saw-mills were
built-one a mile and a half up-stream from Jonesville,
and run by the late Jaduthan Lockwood; the other, still a
mile above, by James Olds and others.
" In the spring of 1837 flour sold at $9 per 100 pounds;
oats as high as $2.50; corn was scarce, a frost the previous
summer, on August 27, killing most of it. Flour, pork,
butter, cheese, dried apples, in fact, most of the necessaries
of life, were imported from Ohio.
"In a few years improvements were so rapid, and no
outlet for surplus produce, wheat sold for 35 cents per
bushel; pork and beef, $2 and $2.50 per hundred, in
goods or store pay-could not get salt for it; oats, 10 cents,
and corn, 20 cents per bushel; butter, if very good, brought
5 cents in 1843.
" The embryo city of Hillsdale was located near where
the county fair-grounds now are. A saw-mill had been
erected by Messrs. Cook & Ferris, and I remember of attending a celebration of the glorious 4th of July up there
amongst the oak-grubs. The matter of the removal of the
county-seat from Jonesville to Hillsdale was before the
Legislature at Detroit. A committee from Jonesville
urged the unfitness of the location, it being, as they said,
in a swamp; but they were met by our representative, B.
B. Willett, who arose in his place and said that Hillsdale
was not in a swamp at all, but situated in a beautiful oakgrove, with a sand and gravel soil. At the next town-meeting William T. Howell was elected Justice of the Peace to
mete justice to them.
" In 1840 the old Indian chief, Baw Beese, with the
remnant of his tribe, was called upon to depart and leave
their hunting-grounds and the graves of their fathers, and
take up their abode in a distant country. As they passed
through Jonesville, escorted by a few United States soldiers,
they looked sad and dejected. This was on a beautiful
Sabbath morning, and it was sad to reflect upon the necessity of such a measure in the interests of civilization."
Hon. Henry Packer, now a resident of Jonesville, emigrated here from the State of Connecticut, arriving in May,

1835, and purchasing a farm on the Adrian road, a mile

i
I

east of the village. He returned to Connecticut, and the
following September brought his family back with him.
One Thomas French had built a log house on the place the
previous year. In the spring of 1840 Mr. Packer moved
into Litchfield, where he resided until the spring of 1864,
when he returned to Jonesville, and has since made it his
home. When he first came to this village the only frame
buildings in it were the stores of Charles Gregory and Cook
& Ferris, and the frame part of the "Fayette House."
Mr. Packer has held the principal offices in the gift of his
townsmen,-highway commissioner, justice of the peace,
and supervisor,-and in 1844 represented his district in
the State Legislature. He was afterward judge of the
Probate Court of Hillsdale County. While justice of the
peace, soon after his arrival here, he was called upon to
issue a warrant for a fugitive slave from Kentucky. When
the negro was brought into court and the case was about
to proceed, W. W. Murphy, then practicing law here, spoke
to Mr. Packer, and the latter decided that in order to recover the negro his alleged owners must bring satisfactory
proof that Kentucky was a slave State. It was necessary
for the prosecution to go to Detroit to decide the matter,
and failing in finding sufficient evidence the man was discharged! A similar case was not long afterwards brought
up in Philadelphia, Pa., and the decision of Mr. Packer,
" of Jonesville, Mich.," was there cited, and the same decision rendered in that instance also. It was a mere matter
of form, but it was enough to secure the negro's freedom,
to the undoubted chagrin of his owners.
In 1850, Mr. Packer and a few friends organized the
first agricultural society in the county, naming it the
c" Hillsdale Agricultural Society." Mr. Packer was elected
President, and Isaiah McCollum, Secretary. This was the
starting-point of the present flourishing society, and the
organization had an existence of several years.
Judge Packer's father-in-law, Amaziah Wright, from
Colchester, Conn., settled in Jonesville in 1837. His
old log house was standing until within recent years, occupying a position a short distance north of the present residence of the judge.
The first permanent merchants in Jonesville were Messrs.
Cook & Ferris,t who established themselves in business
here in 1834. Chauncey W. Ferris, of this firm, a native
of Cato, Cayuga Co., N. Y., settled in Jonesville in May,
1834. His partner, John P. Cook, removed to Hillsdale
in 1836, and, in company with Mr. Ferris, built a flouringmill in 1837. He became quite prominent in that place,
and was a large contractor during the Iconstruction of the
Michigan Southern Railway. He has also been largely
interested in banking, mercantile, and lumber business;
was the first treasurer of Hillsdale County; postmaster of
Hillsdale in 1838, and has represented his district in the
Senate and House.
Following these gentlemen in the trade at Jonesville
were Messrs. Delavan & Attwater, and Charles Gregory, as
early as 1835-36.
Gen. George C. Munro came to Jonesville Aug. 20,

t See account of first mercantile establishment, in this chapter, as
given by George C. Munro.
I:

i

- 1834, by Baxter & Sisson.-HISToRIAN.