Jasper County Democrat, Volume 6, Number 22, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 September 1903 — THE WEEKLY HISTORIAN [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

THE WEEKLY HISTORIAN

ONB HUNDRED YBABS AGO, French residents of Martinique began putting th* Island in a etat* of defense against a threatened attack by the British fleet A score of American seamen were seized in the streets of London by British naval official* and forced to *erv* on British warship*. Complaint was made because American shopkeepers gave only 90 cent* in exchange for sl, by computing the new cent as equal to a penny of the old currency. Excitement was caused at New York by newe that American ships had been seized in French ports because their captains failed to certify the cargoes contained no British goods. Capts. Meriwether Lewie and William Clark began preparations at Louisville, Ky., for the famous “Lewis and Clark” expedition to the Pacific ocean, ordered by President Thomas Jefferson. bbventt-fivk tears Aoa Gold was discovered in Spottsylvania County, Virginia. The fint Durham short horned stock wa* imported into the United State*. A canal across the isthmus of Panama was projected by the Netherlands government. Construction of one of the earliest railroads in th* United States, at Charleston, S. C., was aided by an order of the Treasury Department admitting iron for its use at 25 per cent ad valorem instead of S3O per ton.

FIFTY YEARS AGO, The logbook of the Savannah, the first steamship to cross the Atlantic, was placed on exhibition at the Crystal palace in New York, where it attracted large crowds. Pltro Bachi, a Sicilian exile Implicated in Murat’s attempt to reascend the throne of Naples in 1815, died at Harvard University, where he was employed as instructor. A “fast mail” schedule between WaeffiIngton and Cincinnati was arranged eo as to cover the distance in forty hours, or twelve hours less than the trip trad been made theretofore. Jefferson Davis, then Secretary of War, was given an ovation at Boston, where he had gone on an official visit. Cholera was epidemic in Cuba, all of the slaves on many plantations being swept off within a week. Engineers who were planning the Union Pacific Railroad estimated that it would cost one-fifth of a cent a mile jvr passenger to run a train with accommodations for 200 persons from the Mississippi river to San Francisco.

FORTY YEARS AGO. The city of Lawrence, Kan., was surrounded at 4 a. m. by Quantrell’* rebel guerrillas, 180 citlsens shot down in cold blood, the stores pillaged, and the town then burned. Gen. Wilder’s artillery began the bombardment of Chattanooga, Tenn., where Gen. Bragg’s rebel army was stationed. London sympathizers with American rebels were estimated to have lost $4,000,000 on rebel securities to that date. Confederate currency was quoted at eight cents on the dollar. A battalion of the Sixteenth, cavalry was attacked at Vandalia, 111., by 400 armed rebel rympathizers under command of a former United States army officer, several persons being killed. Brig. Gen. Jeff Thomson and 100 rebel guerrillas were captured at Pocahontas, Mo., and narrowly escaped lynching.

THIRTY YEARS AGO. Gen. Thoma* B. Van Buren was accused by a national commission with profiting from government contracts let by him as United States commissioner to the Vienna exposition. The Philadelphia centennial exposition was threatened with failure because of inability to raise the needed $15,000,000 and personal rivalry among the commissioners. Members of the ku-klux band were ■aid to have committed fifty murders in Kentucky within three year*, while the whipping of negroes and persons who employed them was of nightly occurrence. t TWBNTY YEARS AGO, Don Carlos, pretender to th* Spanish throne, reached New York from Havre. New York police were asked to guard Lord Chief Justice Coleridge of England from possible assassination by Irish nationalists during his approaching visit there. Ths State of Virginia demanded $732,800 in cash from the United States treasury as Its final share of the notorious “grab” bill of 1836, by which the surplus revenues were deposited with the States and neevr repaid. TZN YEARS AGO. . Twenty-five acres of the residence portion of South Chicago was destroyed by firs. Debate on the repeal of the Sherman silver purchase bill was begun in the House of Representatives. Ex-Speaker Thomas B. Reed, in aa address tn the National House of Representatives on the proposed repeal of the Sherman law, declared that a majority of American voters would oppose free silver 'coinage if given a dhancs to d»* elan