CHAPTER XVI. EVENTS OF THE YEAR 1849. CREATION OF MINNESOTA TERRITORY-SAINT PAUL MADE THE CAPITAL-HOW THE NEWS WAS RECEIVED ESTABLISHMENT OF THE "PIONEER"-DESCRIPTION OF SAINT PAUL IN 1849-RAPID GROWTH-EVENTS OF THE DAY-MEMOIRS OF GOVERNOR RAMSEY, JUDGE GOODRICH, &C. WE E now enter on a period of our history crowded with the most important events. In fact, this chapter opens upon a new era in the career of our city and State. Minnesota was on the eve of her political birth. And Saint Paulthe little hamlet of bark-roofed cabins"-was just trembling with eagerness to make a long spring forward. 66 was that of 1848-9. It commenced with unusual severity-unusually early. Snow fell on November 1. To the inhabitants of the little burg, 200 miles from the nearest settlement and mail supply, (Prairie du Chien,) hemmed in by snow and ice, and cut off, almost, from communication with the world, it must have passed wearily enough. The mails, carried over the vast reaches of snow on a dog-sledge, or a train du glace, came only once in a coon's age," as an old settler expresses it, and a hat-full merely then, but its arrival was an event for the village, and eager was the rush for letters and papers to JACKSON'S. It was not until January that news of Gen. TAYLOR's election was received, and also advices from Delegate SIBLEY, who is working hard at Washington to organize a Territory, but not much encouraged at the prospects of success. 66 HOW SAINT PAUL BECAME THE CAPITAL. Indeed, our good city came within an ace of not being the Capital of Minnesota at all. When Gen. SIBLEY arrived in Washington, his credentials were presented at the opening of the session, by Hon. JAMES WILSON, of New Hampshire, and referred to the Committee on Elections. This committee held several meetings on the matter, and were addressed by Gen. SIBLEY, in favor of his recognition, and by Hon. Mr. BOYDen, of North Carolina, and others, adversely. The committee did not report, finally, until January 15, 1849, when a majority. (5,) reported in favor of Gen. SIBLEY'S admission, and a minority, (4,) against it. The majority report was adopted, however, and he was admitted. His first work was to secure the organization of Minnesota Territory, as determined on by the Stillwater Convention. Upon consultation, it was deemed best that the bill should be introduced from the Committee on Territories in the Senate. It was prepared by Hon. STEPHEN A. DOUGLAS, chairman, by whom the draft was sent to Gen. SIBLEY, for his perusal. He noticed that Mendota had been designated as the Capital, whereas, it had been the wish of the people generally, especially of those participating in the Convention, to have Saint Paul fixed as the seat of government. Gen. SIBLEY, without delay, called on Senator DOUGLAS, and urged him to make that change. A meeting of the committee was at once called, and the matter taken up. Gen. SIBLEY argued that most of the inhabitants of the proposed Territory resided east of the Mississippi, and there was an unanimous wish to have the Capital on that side. Saint Paul was one of the most prominent places in the region, well located for the seat of government, and was a regularly platted town, and the land had been entered, so that good titles to property could be had, &c. Senator DOUGLAS opposed the change. He said he had been at Mendota, not long before. and was so much pleased with the geographical position of Mendota, at the confluence of two important rivers, he had then fixed on it as a good site for the future Capital of this region. Moreover, the bulk of area, and, ere long, of population, would be west of the Mississippi, and the Capital should be on the west bank. He thought the top of Pilot Knob, at Mendota, would be a grand place for the State House, as it afforded such a beautiful and extensive view of the valleys of the two rivers.* Gen. SIBLEY persisted in the change, and Senator DOUGLAS, after some solicitation, conceded it, and Saint Paul was fixed on as the seat of the Capital, instead of Mendota, after the two places had hung wavering in the balance for some days. Then some member objected to the name, and said there were too many Saints" in this locality-and this stupid objector had to be argued with, &c. The bill, so amended, was introduced in the Senate, but its passage met with considerable opposition, as it did also, in the House. Gen. SIBLEY worked night and day for it, and made personal appeals to all the members he could influence. Hon. H. M. RICE arrived in Washington, about this time, on private business, and threw his earnest efforts and personal influence in the scale also, being personally acquainted with a number of members. The issue was doubtful for some days, but our tutelar saint kindly turned the current in our favor, and the bill finally passed, being approved March 3, 1849. RECEPTION OF THE NEWS AT SAINT PAUL. In the slow movements of mails in those days, especially during the season known as the breaking up of winter, it took five weeks for the news to reach Saint Paul. The snow had commenced to melt about March 1, and the dog mail-sledge was suspended. The only way was to wait for a boat, and the news from Lake Pepin was, that the ice was firm and hard. Our last mail had arrived about the first of March, with news * In connection with this statement of Gen. SIBLEY'S successful efforts to locate the Capital at Saint Paul, it might be mentioned, that, in 1853, while Gen. S. was running as a candidate for re-election as Delegate, the charge was made against him, by some partisan journals, of hostility to the interests of Saint Paul, as he was at that time liv. ing at Mendota, and some of his property was there. The paragraphs came under the eye of Senator DOUGLAS, and, without solicitation or suggestion, he wrote a statement of the course of Gen. S. in regard to the location of the Capital, and stated that it was unjust that he should be accused of unfriendliness to Saint Paul interests, since he had secured the location of the Capital here, in obedience to the wishes of his constituents, when, to have allowed it to be located at Mendota, would have been of great pecuniary advantage to him. It might be remarked, too, that, when Senator DOUGLAS was here, in 1857, he freely admitted that Gen. S. was right in his conviction that Saint Paul was a much better point for the Capital than Mendota. two months old. It was now the second week in April, and expectation and anxiety was strained to the utmost tension. A communication in the first number of the Pioneer signed D. L., (DAVID LAMBERT,) graphically describes the reception of the news of the organization of the Territory, under the caption, "The Breaking up of a Hard Winter." "The last has been the severest winter known in the Northwest for many years. During five months the communication between this part of the country and our brethren in the United States has been difficult and unfrequent. A mail now and then from Prairie du Chien, brought up on the ice in a 'train' drawn sometimes by horses and sometimes by dogs, contained news so old that the country below had forgotten all about it. When the milder weather commenced, and the ice became unsafe, we were completely shut out from all communication for several weeks. Sometime in January, we learned that Gen. ZACHARY TAYLOR was elected President of the United States. We had to wait for the arrival of the first boat to learn whether our Territory was organized, and who were its Federal officers. How anxiously was that boat expected! The ice still held its iron grasp on Lake Pepin. For a week the arrival of a boat had been looked for every hour. pectation was on tiptoe. Ex 66 Monday, the ninth of April, had been a pleasant day. Toward evening the clouds gathered, and about dark commenced a violent storm of wind, rain, and loud peals of thunder. The darkness was only dissipated by vivid flashes of lightning. On a sudden, in a momentary lull of the wind, the silence was broken by the groan of an engine. In another moment, the shrill whistle of a steamboat thrilled through the air. Another moment, and a bright flash of lightning revealed the welcome shape of a steamboat just rounding the bluff, less than a mile below Saint Paul. In an instant the welcome news flashed like electricity throughout the town, and, regardless of the pelting rain, the raging wind, and the pealing thunder, almost the entire male population rushed to the landing-as the fine steamboat, ‘Dr. Franklin, No. 2,' dashed gallantly up to the landing. Before she was made fast to the moorings, she was boarded by the excited throng. The good captain and clerk [Capt. BLAKELEY] were the great men of the hour. Gen. TAYLOR cannot be assailed with greater importunity for the loaves and fishes' than they were for news and newspapers. At length the news was known, and one glad shout resounding through the boat, taken up on shore, and echoed from our beetling bluffs and rolling hills, proclaimed that the bill for the organization of Minnesota Territory had become a law!" The long agony was over. Saint Paul was its Capital. But let us look at the Minnesota was a Territory, and CONDITION OF THE TERRITORY at that time. It was but little more than a wilderness. Its entire white population could not have been more than 1,000 persons. When the census was taken, four months later, after many hundred immigrants had arrived, there were only 4,680 enrolled-and 317 of these were connected with the army, and of the 637 at Pembina, but few were white. The portion of the Territory west of the Mississippi was still unceded by the Indians. From the southern line of the State to Saint Paul, there were not more than two or three white men's habitations along the river, now gemmed with flourishing and handsome cities, and the steamers ascending the river had no regular landing places, except to "wood up.” Indeed, such a terra incognita as existed at that time, over the now well settled State of Minnesota, seems more the condition of a century ago than of twenty-six years. But, with this feeble array, the people were big with expectation. The elements of empire here, were plastic yet and warm,” and needed only the right men to mould them into a prosperous State. Fortunately, we had the men. Minnesota may well be proud of her pioneers. The people of to-day and coming years owe them gratitude and honor, and, in view of the success and prosperity of our State, it may well be said, they builded better than they knew." California was just then offering its stores of gold to any one lucky enough to reach there, and it seemed as if all the country was on the move to the El Dorado. Minnesota, almost unknown, lying in a latitude deemed to be semi-arctic in its character, and inhabited by savages, could scarcely expect to draw immigration. Especially Saint Paul-what would be its condition under the new order of events? And, presuming that people came here, what resources were there to furnish them business and employment? The Indian trade, supplying the frontier forts, the lumber business and its supplies, a little fur trade, etc., was |