CHAPTER XIII. 



ROCK ISLAND COUNTY. 



That part of Eock Island county north of Rock river is bounded on 

 the south by Rock river, on the west by the Mississippi river, and 

 on the north and east by the Marais d'Ogee slough, and a portion of 

 AYhiteside county. It is an irregularly shaped, triangular piece of land, 

 some twenty -eight and one-half miles long on its western boundary, 

 about seventeen miles wide across the north end, and gradually tapers 

 to a point at the junction of the two rivers a short distance below Rock 

 Island city. 



Its physical features, and surface configuration, are a good deal diver- 

 sified. Broad sand prairies, low alluvial bottom lauds, abrupt bluffy 

 highlands, and various combinations of these, make up the general face 

 of the country. At Cordova the bluffs rise abruptly from the sandy 

 plain. They follow the trend of the Mississippi river close along its 

 shore, and are abrupt, broken, and rough. About Moline and Rock 

 Inland they recede a mile or two from the river but strike Rock river 

 at Camden. Up this latter stream they continue for a few miles, rising 

 high and abrupt from the water's edge. Soon they commence drawing 

 away from this latter river, leaving a low alluvial bottom. They then 

 trend off to the north, leaving the same low bottom between themselves 

 and the Maredosia slough, along the Whiteside county line. Following 

 this course five or six miles, they suddenly bend to the west, and strike 

 the Mississippi near Cordova, the place of beginning. This part of the 

 cciuity has in it six named townships, not bounded by regular township 

 lines, but made up mostly of irregularly-shaped fractional government 

 townships. These contain somewhere near one hundred and seventy- 

 eight square miles or sections of land. 



All that portion of the county within the above bluff line boundary, is 

 highlands or uplands, from fifty to one hundred feet above the general 

 water level of the Mississippi river. It is abrupt, broken, rolling, and 

 rough. Much of it, especially the hills and ravines, is covered with a 



rering growth of timber and brush. Pleasant Valley, cutting ac: 

 this upland region from Hampton on the Mississippi to Carbon Cliff on 



