Collections of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1903 edition. Excerpt: ... Noah Webster, Michillimackinack) as early as 1832, had been to the verge of civilization, and was expected to produce a description in detail. By the rapid enlargement of American occupation, it has now ceased to be a point of great interest, and will soon attract attention only for the historical reminiscences that attach to the name. Always the resting place of the Indian wandering from one Northern Sea to another, his camp-fire was seldom extinguished upon its shore. About 1650, the countrymen of Father Hennepiri and La Salle came along to dicker for furs, mingling the gibberish of the Frenchman with the gutturals of the native. Then the Englishman located himself there, with a half civil, and half military possession under the treaty of 1763. By the Eevolution, the Americans acquired title, and in 1794 obtained possession of the Island. The military occupied the old British fort, named Holmes by the Americans, in the rear of the present stockade, until 1812, when it fell by surprise into the hands of the English. The issue of the war made it again American ground, and since 1819 a small garrison has been in occupation, being the center of fur trading operations in the North-West till within two years.f It was the neutral ground of the Indian who came from beyond the Mississippi to get goods, presents and whiskey, and the harvest ground of the white man who took his furs, for a penny, and sold them to his brother or sister for a pound. But the red man is no longer congregated here, and the white man has gone after him to "Fond du Lac," at the extreme of Lake Superior. The garrison is therefore unnecessary, the missionary deserted by his flock removed to "He Point," everything points to the speedy decline, if not the abandonment of this wild...