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NYPLRESEARCHLIBRARIES ii Lin i i.i'hii.',.iiii'.hm;iii "V /"•"" HISTORY OF Walworth County WISCONSIN BY ALBERT CLAYTON BECKWITH ILLUSTRATED VOLUME I 1912 BOWEN & COMPANY B. F. INDIANAPOLIS. INDIANA LIBRAE \- PUBLIC .Q iyi& DEDICATION. This work i> respectfully dedicated ti> THE PIONEERS, since departed. May the memory of those who laid down their burdens by the wayside ever be fragrant as the breath of summer flowers, for their toils and sacrifices have made Walworth Count) a garden of sun- shine and delights. AUTHOR'S PREFACE In preparing this work, which.is not so much a county history as a collec- tion of notes to serve the coming historian, the following sources of informa- tion have been used freely: The printed and manuscript collections of the historical societies of the state and county ; the records of the adjutant-gen- eral's office at Madison; the Legislative Manuals and other official publications of the state; the Geological and Hydrographic Surveys of Wisconsin; the county records at Elkhorn. including those at the office of the county jndge, county clerk, clerk of the circuit court, treasurer, register of deeds, and superin- tendent of schools; the books of the County Agricultural Society; "History of Walworth County" (Chicago, 1882); Cravath's "Annals of Whitewater"; Simmons's "Annals of Lake Geneva" the files of Delavan, Elkhorn and White- ; water newspapers; the personal recollections of the compiler and of many of his known and unknown friends, within and without the county; the tomb- stones of forty-five burial grounds; and unreckonable minor or incidental papers, pamphlets, documents and letters. A few words as to the plan and arrangement of this volume may not be wholly useless. The theory of its construction is that a local history, its interest, if any, confined to a narrow plat of ground, cannot have in it too much oi the personal element. An arch-necromancer's uncanny skill could not avail to restore anything like the semblance, even though but ghostly, of all those men who once answered to the names found in the lists of land-patentees ot [838, in the juror lists of [839, and in the town-officer lists of [843; but the patient searcher of fading r—ecords may find a date, a wife's name, a hint oi heirs wrangling over a will something to show that these men have not all of them become as forgotten kings ,,f pre-Mosaic dynasties. The neighboring counties, in two States, were much like Walworth in their origin and development ; and human nature was and is the same in all ol them. Walworth included. But there were little lines in the lives of the earlier men and women of Walworth that are yet of some human interest to their descendant- and successors. To., little can be recovered of lives Ion- gone to make each one's tale over-tedious. for mosl of them, little more than the length of a tombstone inscription remains, but for us that little differentiates AUTHOR S PREFACE. Walworth from Rock and McHenry and all the other counties of the Union and the Dominion. [f this work were our county history's last word, far more could with A reason be required of it than is herein performed. little, no doubt, worth another workman's consideration, is added to the store of historic material. It will be observed that in the lesser divisions of the volume the town- art- taken in their alphabetical order for their readier finding. Citizen- of each town of whom nearly nothing was learned but their names and a date or two for each, are named with their towns. They of whom more detail was found are placed in alphabetical order as a county list. It would be pleasing to acknowledge explicitly all the favors shown by old and new friends, official and unofficial: but the tally-list would be very long. and omissions would seem coldly careless if not intentional. No person, how- ever, can make even a barely passable local history without that kindly co- operation nowhere to be found more intelligent and willing than in "glorious old Walworth." Albert C. Beckwith. Elkhorn, July 15, 1912.