142 



From all I can learn, tLere must ha\e been a trading post established at La 

 Pointe on or before 1722, which was probably as early as any permanent estab- 

 lishment of the kind at this place. But as the immense trade on this river and 

 its numerous branches, brought more voijageurs to this country than to the Lake 

 at that eai-Iy day, and especially as the country here oflered greater facilities for 

 farming than the Lake country, the settlement here became larger and more per- 

 manent than that of the Lake. 



There were but few Americans in this settlement, previous to the occupancy 

 of the Foi-t by the United States army in 1816. In 1805, Lieutenant Pike 

 found a few Americans here ; but the most of the traders and settlers were 

 Canadian French. When I moved my family to this place in 1836, there were 

 but three or four American families in the place, out of the garrison and the 

 Indian department. At that time the Indian title had not been extinguished to 

 any portion of the country north of the Wisconsin, except to this prairie, as 

 above stated, by common consent. 



In 1830, or thereabout. Judge J. H. Lockwood, under a heense from the War 

 Department, and by consent of the Sioux, to whom he paid an annual ground 

 rent, built a saw mill on the Red Cedar branch of the Chippewa, at which estab- 

 lishment some gardening, but no farming was done. In 1838, after the treaties 

 with the Indians of 1837 had been ratified, one company ascended the St. Croix 

 to the Falls; another to the Falls of Chippewa; and, in 1839, another company 

 went to the Falls of Black River — all of them to build and run saw mills. But 

 each became the nucleus of more extended settlements, which have been ex- 

 tending themselves wider and wider, until they settled a part of Minnesota, 

 which has been taken from us ; and the counties of La Pointe, St. Croix, Chip- 

 pewa, La Crosse and Bad Ax, which have been organized from the w^estern por- 

 tion ; and the counties of Richland, Sauk and Adams, from the eastern poition 

 of what was originally Crawford County. Leaving the present county to contain 

 658 square miles; and, in 1850, 2399 inhabitants. But as the tide of emi- 

 gration is rushing in upon us at a rapid rate, there is probably from one-fouith 

 to one-third more inhabitants now than then. 



" The general formation of the country" is hilly. Some portion of our ori- 

 ginal county is level, but more of it undulating. The level portions of it are 

 at the heads of the largest streams, where it is apt to be swampy and marsh3\ 

 Near the ^Mississippi the hills or blufts rise in some places 500 feet above the 

 river; but as you ascend the streams, the hills lessen down to a gentle undula- 

 tion on the small streams, and to a level or marsh and swamp on the larger ones. 

 In the present limits of the county the land is generally hilly or rolling. The 

 level Or marshy portions are on the margins or bottoms of the great rivers. 

 The whole of the original, as well as the present county, abounds in streams of 



