407                                                       HISTORY OF MARSHALL COUNTY

 

 

CLOSING WORDS

 

The historian comes now to the end of his part in the production of this volume, and he does not feel like closing the task now at an end without a final word to his readers. Those who are without experience in history writing can have no conception of the labor and difficulties that confront the historian even in so insignificant a work as that which precedes these closing words. The historian is aware that a peroration ought not to be necessary to the elucidation of the matter contained in the work, for it should be sufficiently self-explanatory without it. It looks like an attempt to paint the lily, or add anther tinge to the rainbow; but it is not. It is for the purpose of begging the reader’s pardon for whatever he may see in the work that does not please him, and to say to him that the historian regrets a thousand times more than he does the matter about which he may be displeased was one of the psychological happenings that could not be avoided. As this is the last work of this kind, or any other for that matte, he will ever attempt, the disappointed reader may congratulate himself that his affliction will cease with the perusal of the foregoing pages.

 

In the preparation of this work it has been the aim of the historian to gather together the facts and to treat briefly every subject relating to the inhabitants of the county from the earliest period down to the present time, and so in his researches he has gone back in the misty mazes of the past so far that the memory of man runneth not to the contrary. He has dug into the earth and brought forth several fine specimens of the bones of the mastodon, which were supposed to exist at an epoch anterior to man. He has also investigated so far as time and opportunity permitted the Mound of the mastodon and prior to the coming of the American Indiana. Unmistakable evidences of the presence of the Mound Builders in this part of the country have been found but nothing as to their history, or from whence they came or whither they went was discovered. The buffalo were plentiful here prior to the coming of the Indians, and some few specimens were seen in this region a few years prior to the settlement of the county in the early part of the last century. The Pottawatomie Indians to the number of 1,500 or 2,000 occupied the territory now embraced in Marshall County. The historian has given a full account as to how the white settlers became possessed of the territory belonging to the Indians; how their lands were taken from them and they were driven away beyond the Missouri River, which he believes will be the most interesting part of this work. They were the first owners of the land and the first inhabitants, and as such should be accorded the most prominent place in any history of the county.

 

It has been the aim of the historian to confine himself to matter connected in some way with the history of the county, and to state the facts as near, as they could be ascertained, embellished, and such flights of rhetoric at his command as the subject seemed to require, and in no instance has he

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

HISTORY OF MARSHALL COUNTY.                               408

 

ventured an opinion of his own in regard to the subject about which he has written. He has aimed to occupy the position of a witness sworn to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, testifying before those who are to sit in judgment upon the testimony submitted.

For more than a year the author has devoted all the time at his disposal to the preparation of this work, having in view the sole object to make it as complete and perfect as a work of this kind could be made. Every source of information that promised results so far as possible has been thoroughly investigated, and events, facts and dates so far as could be done have been verified and the whole arranged in a readable connected story of the early settlement and history of Marshall county.

 

The work has been a labor of love, and in making it as complete and satisfactory to the reader as possible the author leaves it to the citizens of Marshall county as a memorial of the love and esteem he bears for them and the grand old county where his entire active life has been spent, and where he has many times been honored, possibly beyond his merits, with honorable and high official positions.

 

To many friends who have assisted in, the work the writer is under lasting obligation, and to one and all he extends his heartfelt thanks to the publishers of this work especially, and their gentlemanly assistants who have at all times rendered valuable aid when the opportunity presented itself, sincere thanks are hereby tendered.

 

Hoping and trusting that that charity which covers a multitude of shortcomings will be extended in all its fullness, and invoking the indulgence of the reader in behalf of whatever may be found amiss, the historian, bidding each and all "a hearty, warm, fond adieu," turns his face from the "graves of the dead past" to the opening scenes of a brighter and better future.

 

 DANIEL MCDONALD