1600s - Early 1800s - Explorers' era of Southernmost Illinois
Explorers Marquette and Joliet in 1673 wrote of the unusual Tower Rock in the Mississippi, art work on the rock bluffs, in what is now Union County, and the terrible mosquitoes at the mouth of the Ohio River.
A French buffalo-hide tanning plant - Va Bache in 1703 (probably near Joppa,
not far from Cantonment Wilkinsonville, but a century earlier) led to the brutal slaughter of 13,000 buffalo that roamed Southern Illinois. Outposts were set up across the region, from near current St. Louis, to northern Tennessee, to receive the skins. The skins took seven years to process. Malaria and native Americans helped stop tanning operation. Some researchers place the operation nearer Mound City.
While George Washington's troops survived the Valley Forge winter of 1777-78, then routed the British from Philadelphia, George Rogers Clark took Illinois territory (Kaskaskia, Cahokia, Vincinnes) from the redcoats on the western front [map: Massac to Kaskaskia].
George Rogers Clark established Fort Jefferson, or Clarksville, KY, just south of present Wickliffe, a few miles south of the Ohio-Mississippi confluence, to help maintain the Southern Illinois and Indiana forts he had taken for Virginia. Fort Jefferson was short lived. UKy description | Rootsweb details
Ballard County History says Fort Jefferson was put back into action, and Fort Holt, north of Wickliffe, was used during the Civil War.
One of the oldest roads in Southernmost Illinois is the Caledonia Road connecting Caledonia Landing with Jonesboro, and "lined with chicken feathers". Perhaps the oldest road used by European settlers of the area is the Wilkinsonville, Cape Girardeau, Kaskaskia trail.
Cantonment Wilkinsonville, a large U.S. military camp used for only a few years, overlooked the Ohio near Grand Chain at the top of the Ohio River's crescent shape, between Cairo and Metropolis. Cantonment Wilkinsonville is one of Southernmost Illinois' best kept secrets. Many longtime residents near the site are not even aware it existed. Wilkinsonville helped the United States win and almost helped lose the West. Lewis and Clark did not stop as they passed. Check history references for the Wilkinson - Aaron Burr conspiracy.
Then they stopped four days in Cairo to familiarize themselves with their surveying instruments.
Here's a map of the Mississippi / Ohio River confluence drawn by Lewis & Clark. Until the Louisiana Purchase seven months earlier, the future site of Cairo had been the western edge of the country.
While at Cairo, they practiced using their navigation equipment and began daily logs.
Lewis and Clark made their way north on the Mississippi, spending a few nights on sandbars, etc. They stopped in Cape Girardeau. Then, like Marquette and Joliet in 1673, they were fascinated with the "Grand Tower Rock near Union County's nortwestern corner." Lutherans from Germany landed at Tower Rock a few decades later (1839), and began a major North American synod.
Perrin du Lac traveled the Ohio River in 1801-1803. His diary says he found Wilkinsonville and the remains of Ft. Massac.
Less than 10 years after President Jefferson closed Wilkinsonville, and only a few miles downstream along the Ohio, a new city was laid out to replace Washington, D.C., as the hub of the country, both geographically and politically.
Washington, D.C. burned in 1812. Planners drew elaborate maps of a new city just north of Mound City to replace the nation's capitol. The new city for a time was home to 700 people. But it faded. Riverboats couldn't land there because of a sandbar. Fire, possibly arson, burned the town. Disease epidemics took many lives. D.C. was rebuilt. The Southern Illinois town is still listed on some maps as "America", and some street signs still bear the names of states, but now consists of only a few rural houses.
A large Johnson County began in 1812 as part of Indiana territory, six years before Illinois' statehood, and covered Southernmost Illinois. The other counties were carved from it in the next three decades.
Old Shawneetown, Illinois, in Gallatin County along the Ohio River, has the oldest bank in Illinoisthat once refused a loan to folks from the north, because "Chicago would never amount to anything." A picturesque Greek architecture bank across the street, later, was a main bank for the state in the early 1800s when nearby salt mines were busy.
The Rose Hotel at Elizabethtown was an inn for Ohio River Valley travelers of more than 100 years ago. It is restored, and offers a panoramic view up and down the Ohio.
Cave-In-Rock was an Ohio River landmark and curiosity as early as 1729. It had real pirates ready to steal from and kill unsuspecting settlers headed west. The exterior of the cave is shown in the 1950s classic film, "How the West Was Won,". More from ( IllinoisHistory ) .
Many flatboats came down the Ohio, carrying a family's entire possessions. Many were recycled for their lumber, but one was recently found. Researchers found a flatboat near 'America' [pics].
In 1830, Congress passed a bill permitting the removal of all Native Americans living east of the Mississippi River. The Cherokee "Trail of Tears" [-more-] in 1838-1839 crossed the Ohio at Golconda then followed what is now Rt. 146 through Vienna, Anna, Jonesboro, to Cape Girardeau, as they came from the Carolinas to Oklahoma [map]. The white settlers' greed for their gold mines helped force them out.
Shawnee Native Americans across the area were an advanced, peaceful group, driven by white settlers from of the Ohio-Kentucky area. Shawneetown was named after them.
Trail of Tears Encampment
6890 State Route 146 (two miles west of IL Route 37)
Buncombe (Johnson County)
In 1820, the Bridges Family established a tavern and a wayside store in far southern Illinois for guests traveling Old Lusk's Ferry Road, between the Ohio and Mississippi rivers. In 1838, this route, which became known as the “Trail of Tears,’ was used for the forced removal of Cherokee Indians from the southeastern U.S. According to published sources from the period, part of the Bridges´ property was used as a winter encampment for the Cherokees. The timber-plank walls of the wayside store—the state's only known surviving structure with a connection to the Trail of Tears National Historic Trail—remain intact within an existing barn on the property.
