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Howard County And Fayette

I found the History of Howard County, Missouri to the Civil War in some of my Dad's stuff after his death. He had it dated (in his hand) September 3, 1998. Besides that I have no idea where it came from or who wrote it. I've used parts of it on three webpages entitled: Howard County And Fayette, Little Dixie, and Tyranically-evil And Cruel?

Dad and I were born in Fayette, Missouri and he stayed there until WWII. I don't remember ever living in Howard County, but Grandma and Papa, five blood uncles and one aunt were on farms there all the while I was growing up. With over thirty first cousins and I'm not sure how many second and third cousins there, I spent a lot of summers in Howard County. It still is the place "Johnmeyers" call home.

In the late 1700s, the Spanish Government of Louisiana began offering liberal land grants to American pioneers who would move even farther west from the newly-formed United States ... cross the great Mississippi River ... and start permanent settlements in a region of upper Louisiana, now known as Missouri. Among the earliest American settlers in the region were Daniel Boone and his sons, Nathan and Daniel Morgan. The Boones and other pioneer families ... from Virginia and the Carolinas by way of their frontier settlements in Kentucky ... started a small American settlement on the Femme Osage River, about 35 miles from St. Louis, in 1799. On May 23, 1804, as the Lewis and Clark Expedition passed the Femme Osage on its historic journey up the Missouri River and , ultimately, to the Pacific Ocean, Captain William Clark noted that 30 to 40 families were already living in the Boone settlement at that time.

Needing a source of salt for the Femme Osage settlement and for the tiny river villages of St. Louis, St. Charles, and La Charette, Nathan and Daniel Morgan Boone and their partners, James and Jesse Morrison, purchased a salt spring and several acres of land from James MacKay in 1806. This spring and land, originally acquired by MacKay in a Spanish Land Grant in 1797, is located north of the Missouri River in what is now Howard County. In 1807, the Boones and Morrisons founded the Boon's Lick Salt Manufacturing Company at this spring. Boiling the salt water in huge kettles, they began to produce salt and ship it, on keelboats, back to the eastern river settlements over 100 miles away. To transport work and beef cattle and other supplies to the salt manufactory from the Femme Osage area, the Boones and Morrisons used an ancient Indian road, which ran north of the Missouri River and connected St. Charles with the area of the spring. This road, used by Indians for centuries before the arrival of white men, was renamed the "Boon's Lick Road" by the early American settlers, and became the main highway for settlers coming into the area throughout the 1800s. (Parts of this road later became the original U. S. Highway 40).

Two spellings of Daniel Boone's name "Boon" and "Boone" ... appear in literature and cause confusion to modern readers. In Howard, Cooper, and Boone Counties alone, these two different spellings can be found in the words Boon's Lick, Boon's Lick Road, Boon's Lick Country, Boonville, Boonesboro, and Boone County. While "B-o-o-n-e" is the traditional English spelling of the family name, the "B-o-o-n" spelling is attributed to Daniel Boone himself. Like many boys from rural areas of New England in colonial times, Daniel Boone had no formal education, and was given only limited tutoring by his uncle, John Boone, and aunt, Sarah Day Boone. Preferring to spend his time hunting, fanning, and visiting with Delaware Indians who lived near his father's farm, Daniel Boone took little interest in academic subjects, and learned only enough to spell phonetically, i. e. by the way words "sounded." As a result, he was a poor speller who often incorrectly spelled many words, including even his own last name. His "B-o-o-n" spelling was used by the pioneer settlers who named the Boon's Lick, Boon's Lick Road, Boon's Lick Country, and Boonville, and by many of his descendants.

Although a permanent work camp was established for the workmen at the salt lick in 1806 or 1807, the first permanent settlement was not founded in the area until 1810. This settlement, established by Benjamin Cooper, was located two miles southwest of Boon's Lick. By 1812, three forts had been built in present-day Howard County to protect early settlers from Indian attack. Fort Cooper was located at Benjamin Cooper's settlement; Fort Kincaid one mile north of the present, railroad bridge at Boonville; and Fort Hempstead one and one-half miles north of Fort Kincaid. A fourth fort, Fort Head, was built at a spring on the Boonslick Road in southeast Howard County, about three miles north of present-day Rocheport, to protect local settlers during the War of 1812.

Howard County was established in 1816 and named after Benjamin Howard, the territorial governor in office when the Missouri Territory was partitioned from the Louisiana Territory on June 14, 1812. The original size of the county was immense. It contained 22,000 square miles and covered one-third of the present state. When Howard County ... nicknamed "Mother of Counties" ... was partitioned by an act of the Missouri State Legislature in 1825, the following present-day counties were created: Adair, Boone, Caldwell, Carroll, Chariton, Clay, Clinton, Cole, Cooper, Davies, DeKalb, Gentry, Grundy, Harrison, Henry, Howard, Johnson, Lafayette, Linn, Livingston, Macon, Mercer, Moniteau, Morgan, Pettis, Putnam, Randolph, Ray, Saline, Sullivan, Worth ... and parts of Audrain, Benton, Miller, Monroe, St. Clair, and Shelby.

The original townsite of Franklin was also created in 1816 to serve as the new Howard County seat. Following the creation of the Missouri Territory and the War of 1812, many American settlers began coming west to Missouri and the "Boon's Lick Country" to settle in Howard County. These settlers were almost-exclusively southern people from Virginia, the Carolinas, Kentucky, and Tennessee. By 1820, the town of Franklin had grown to a population of 1,500 people, and large parts of the county were being cleared for agricultural production.

On August 14, 1821, William Becknell, a former employee and part-owner of the Boon's Lick Salt Manufacturing Company, organized the first trading caravan from Franklin to the Mexican city of Santa Fe, in what is now New Mexico. Because of the success of Becknell's first and subsequent expeditions, Franklin became famous as the head of the "Santa Fe Trail." The development of this trail aided early American exploration and eventual settlement of the lands in the far west. The most famous Howard Countian to "head west" on the Santa Fe Trail was, undoubtedly, Christopher "Kit" Carson. His father, Lindsay Carson, a North Carolina native and Revolutionary War soldier, had brought his family to the Fort Hempstead area of Howard County in 1811, when Kit was only two years old. A few years after Lindsay Carson was killed in a timber accident in 1818, young Kit was bound as an apprentice to a Franklin saddle-maker by his new step-father, Joseph Martin. In August 1826, Kit joined a trading expedition headed for Santa Fe ... running away from his apprenticeship in Franklin to become, possibly, the most famous trapper, guide, Indian fighter, and scout in American history. In his autobiography, Kit explained that he ran away, because he found saddle making work to be "irksome." His master in Franklin, David Workman ... feeling sympathy and admiration for young Kit and great wanderlust for the west himself ... but required by strict law to offer a public reward for the return of any runaway apprentice or slave ... placed the following notice in the Franklin newspaper on October 6, 1826: "Notice is hereby given to all persons ... That Christopher Carson, a boy about 16 years old, small of his age, but thick-set; light hair, ran away from the subscriber, living in Franklin, Howard County, Missouri, to whom he had been bound to learn the saddler's trade. ONE CENT REWARD will be given to any person who will bring back said boy."

That newspaper, The Missouri Intelligencer, founded in Franklin in 1819, was the first newspaper published west of St. Louis and the Mississippi River. And, kind David Workman, by the way, finally did follow young Kit's example, closed his saddlery in Franklin, and "headed west" himself along the Santa Fe Trail.

In 1823, with the Missouri River encroaching on the town of Franklin, the townsite of Fayette was laid out about 12 miles north as the new county seat. Accessibly located in the center of the county, Fayette was built in the hill country, away from the flood plain that continued to threaten Franklin. With the Missouri River making a long and gently-curving meander down and across the western and southern borders of the county, early settlers soon began to build other new towns that were also protected from river encroachment. In 1828, the town of New Franklin was established on a hill overlooking old Franklin. In 1834, on the prairie at the north border of the county, a group of Virginians, admirers of the great southern republican, John Randolph, established a tiny settlement that they proudly named "Roanoke." Shortly thereafter, another Virginian settlement was established in northeast Howard County named "Monticello." In 1836, the village of Glasgow was built on the northwestern point of the river meander, high above the river on a bluff. And, in 1840, the little town of Boonesboro was established, a few miles south of Boon's Lick.

While some southern settlers coming into the county had the capital and slaves to start large plantations in the rich river bottoms, most were small farmers with little capital and few or no slaves. They were coming to Missouri and Howard County to acquire land and farming opportunities that were no longer available to them in the original southern states. With hemp, tobacco, corn, and hogs as primary agricultural products, Howard County and the other Missouri River counties in the central and western regions of the state were favorite destinations of American settlers migrating to Missouri from the southeast. Besides the Boones and Morrisons, Benjamin Cooper, Benjamin Howard, Kit Carson, and the original pioneer settlers of Forts Cooper, Kincaid, and Hempstead, Howard County became the home of many other, notable people before the War Between the States. Some of these early residents included: Governor Hamilton R. Gamble ... Judge H. Clay Cockerill, noted Southern partisan in the Missouri-Kansas border war ... General John B. Clark, U. S. Congressman and C. S. A. Congressman and Senator ... General John Taylor Hughes, C. S. A. ... General Benjamin F. Jackson, C. S. A. ... General Robert Wilson, U S. A. ... C. S. A. Partisan Ranger Captains, Clifton D. Holtzclaw and Thomas Todd ... and George Caleb Bingham, noted Missouri artist and devout unionist, but outspoken and relentless critic of Union Army policies and atrocities in Missouri during the Civil War.

The town of Fayette is named for the Marquis de Lafayette. Rapid growth and early wealth made the town a cultural and political center. Fayette, centered in a fertile Missouri River County, is surrounded by fine grain and livestock farms. Benjamin Cooper made the county's first permanent settlement in 1810. Two years later Cooper had one of several defensive forts against the Indians in the War of 1812. Iowa, Sac, and Fox tribes ceded their claims to this area in 1824.

Settled largely by Southerners, Howard County and Fayette lie in Missouri's Little Dixie Region. In the Civil War, Fayette did not see much action but progress came to a halt. It was not until after the coming of the Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad, 1873, that the town enjoyed renewed growth. In the pre-Civil War period, Fayette was the center of a powerful political clique, and here for a time lived governors John Miller, 1826-32; Thomas Reynolds, 1840-44; Sterling Price, 1853-57; and Claiborne F. Jackson, 1861. Pioneer lawyers John B. Clark and Abiel Leonard, State Supreme Court judge, also lived here, and here were born Episcopal Bishops Ethelbert Talbot and Abiel Leonard (Jr.); Methodist Bishop E. R. Hendrix and astronomer Henry S. Pritchett.

As the Twentieth Century comes to an end and the Twenty-First Century begins, the traditions of Little Dixie are still alive and well. Outdoorsmen enjoy Little Dixie Lake and Wildlife Area. Children read books loaned by Little Dixie Regional Libraries and high school athletes compete for the Little Dixie Conference Championship. Visitors enjoy the taste of the Little Dixie Smoked Chicken Breast featured at a local restaurant. Bass clubs, fire protection districts and many other organizations call themselves Little Dixie something or another. In all, twenty-four counties in Missouri have been or are "more Dixie than Dixie." There are ninety other counties in Missouri which were part of the indisputable boundaries of the Confederate States of America.

Fayette's rich history and farm heritage has always encouraged strong values, hard work, and hometown hospitality. Fayette's location, reflecting the aura of times past, has many churches, quaint stores and antiques, and a unique County Courthouse and Square, the hub of rural spaciousness. The grounds of the Courthouse contain a gazebo-like bandstand, and memorials to the deceased of the war of 1812 and to the designer of the Missouri State Seal, George Frederick Burckhart, 1782-1864.

Fayette has three historic districts, which include the Central Methodist University Campus, the Downtown Business District, the oldest building in Fayette, erected in 1830, as a Hatter's store, sits on the North side of the square, and the South Main Street Residential District. Many homes and individual buildings throughout Fayette are also listed on the National Register of Historic Sites.

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