Page:History of Iowa From the Earliest Times to the Beginning of the Twentieth Century Volume 1.djvu/231



in beauty and fertility almost any known region of the great West.

During the time occupied by the various explorations of the east and west borders of our future State, the territory had passed nominally under the jurisdiction of various organized territories. After Missouri was admitted into the Union as a State on the 4th of March, 1821, after the adoption of the famous “Missouri Compromise,” all that portion of Missouri Territory north of the northern boundary was left without civil government until 1834. Although no portion of the territory west of the Mississippi River, north of Missouri, had yet been acquired of the various Indian tribes and nations occupying it, and white men could only enter the territory by permission of the Indians, still attempts were made from year to year to settle in that section.

In June, 1829, James L. Langworthy, a native of Vermont, purchased an interest in the Galena lead mines and attempted to procure an interest in Dubuque's old “Mines of Spain.” Securing Indian guides he explored the country between the Turkey and Maquoketa rivers to find the lead mines formerly worked. He made friends with the Indians and gained their permission to work some of the mines. The next year with his brother, Lucius H. Langworthy and a company of miners, he began work. A village of the Sac and Fox Indians which stood at the mouth of Catfish Creek had been depopulated by an attack of Sioux Indians, who killed nearly all of its inhabitants. There were about seventy empty houses standing here when the miners from the Galena region crossed to take possession of the abandoned “Mines of Spain.” Some of the reckless miners thought to intimidate the Indians by burning these cabins and thus prevent their return to the mines. In June, 1830, the miners on the west side of the river determined to organize a local government. They held a meeting and elected a legislature consisting of James L. Langworthy, H. F. Lauder,