Page:History of Iowa From the Earliest Times to the Beginning of the Twentieth Century Volume 3.djvu/398

 north part of the county and in early days its bluffs were covered with timber. BUNCOMBE COUNTY was established in 1851 and named for an officer in the War of the Revolution. It was the extreme northwestern county in the State. While bearing this name there were no permanent settlers within its limits but for eleven years it appeared on the map of Iowa as Buncombe County until at the extra session of the Ninth General Assembly in September, 1862, it was changed to Lyon. BUTLER COUNTY is in the third tier south of the Minnesota line, in the fourth west of the Mississippi River, and contains sixteen congressional townships, making an area of five hundred seventy-six square miles. It was taken from territory formerly embraced in the counties of Fayette and Buchanan, was established in 1851 and named for General William O. Butler, an officer in the Mexican War and Democratic candidate for Vice-President in 1848.

The first white men who settled in the county were two brothers, Harrison and Volney Carpenter who, in 1850, went from Linn County up the Cedar and Shellrock rivers hunting and trapping. They were charmed with the country and made claims and built a log cabin in a grove where the town of Shellrock stands. In September of the same year Henry J. Hicks and Robert T. Crowell, from Wisconsin, settled at Coon Grove near where Clarksville has since been built. During the winter these pioneers carried on their backs supplies for their families from Cedar Falls. They found support through hunting, trapping and fishing until land could be brought under cultivation. In 1851 Jeremiah Perrin, M. A. Taylor, Mahlon B. and William S. Wamsley, Seth Hilton and others came and also entered land.

In 1853 the county-seat was located at Clarksville, a