(From "The History of Winnebago County, Illinois", H F Kett and Co., Chicago, 1877)
HISTORY OF WINNEBAGO COUNTY ................................................................. Page: 450
ROSCOE.
Roscoe is the northeast township of the county, bounded on the north by the Wisconsin State line. The first permanent settlement was made in the fall of 1835, but some Indian traders previously erected and occupied cabins in the grove on Section 32. The remains of the cabins and the track made by the wagon train that accompanied General Atkins in his campaign against the Black Hawk Indians in June, 1832, were still clearly defined when the first settlers came. The maple trees also showed that the Indians had tapped them for sugar-making purposes.
August 3, 1835, R. J. Cross, of Coldwater, Mich., and Colonel Von Hovenburg, with a Pottawatomie Indian for a guide, came into the township from Milwaukee. Col. Von Hovenburg returned to Michigan; Mr. Cross bought a claim of Lavec, an employee of Stephen Mack, upon which he subsequently settled. This claim was covered by the grove in the southwest quarter of Section 32.
450 HISTORY OF WINNEBAGO COUNTY.
In September of the same year, Elijah H. Brown, James B. Lee and William Mead came in from La Porte County, Indiana, and selected claims. Brown built a house on the left bank of Rock river, a little above the mouth of the north branch of the Kinikinick, on the northeast quarter of Section 32, which was the first house built in what subsequently became Roscoe township. In the winter of 1835-6, Messrs. Brown, Lee, Cross and Logan were the only settlers in that part of the county. Mr. Cross had the only horse team in the settlement, and it was kept on the road nearly all the time when the roads were passable, hauling' flour and groceries from Chicago. Mr. Reynolds, of Rolling Prairie, LaPorte County, Indiana, bought Lee's claim, and was the first blacksmith to forge and hammer in that precinct and in the winter of 1836-7 there were only eight families. Until a post office was established at Beloit, the settlers got their mail matter at Chicago; but in the spring of 1837, a post-office was established at Roscoe, and R. M. P. Abell was appointed post-master. In 1837, Henry Abell and his son Franklin, built a saw-mill, the first in the neighborhood. This mill was built at the mouth of the north branch of the Kinikinick, where they proposed to build a village, which they named Roscoe, in honor of Roscoe, an eminent English historian, and when the names of townships were established in 1850, the name was given to the municipality. Under the new order, the first town meeting was held at the house of James K. Knowland, April 1, 1850. J. G. Prentiss was chosen Moderator; John J. Rhodes was elected Supervisor, and Nathaniel Howland, Town Clerk. Mr. Rhodes was continued in office for seven years, and until his death. At the first town meeting or election, 180 votes were polled.
CHURCH Notes.-September. 1836, at a meeting at the house of Smith Jenks, Rev. Mr. Pillsbury, a traveling missionary, of the M. E. Church, took the names of those who wished to unite as a church society. They were: Henry Abell, Smith Jenks, Clarissa Jenks, B. Richardson, Mary Ann Richardson, Albert Tuttle and Simeon Pettibone and wife. These were organized into a class, and for many years it was the only church society known to the settlers. It subsequently grew into prominence and wealth, as it had always been influential for good.
November 7, 1843, a preliminary meeting in the interest of the Congregational Church was held at the house of Alvan Leland. At that meeting the following named representative ministers were present: Revs. Wright, Belvidere; Ebenezer Brown, Byron; M. Benedict, Rockton; M. Hicks. agent of the American Home Missionary Society, and M. Pierson, of the New Haven Theological Seminary. November 28th, the organization was perfected and a society formed composed of the following named members: Alvan Leland, John Bradley, Horace K. Leonard, Thomas R Whipple, Eunice Bradley, Minerva J. Leonard, Delia Whipple, Edmund Bradley, Charles Kerr, John Moir, Hannah Cross, Ann Frances Kerr, E. Moir, Cora Briggs, George Kerr, Sol. W. Leland, Thankful Briggs, and Lydia Meirs -18. Alvin Leland was chosen Deacon; Sol. W. Leland, Clerk. January 3, 1844, Rev. Ebenezer Brown was employed as minister, (He signed April 9, 1859, marriage license of Thomas Ralston and Jane Ralston). Of these members, Deacon Leland died February 8, 184.5; Deacon John Bradley, Roscoe, August 14, 1854; his wife Eunice Bradley, Roscoe, February 14, 1852; S. W. Leland, in Massachusetts, and Delia Whipple in Roscoe.
The first school was taught in Reynolds' old blacksmith shop. The Widow Warner was teacher. May 14, 1840, the township was divided into six school districts.. The school section was mostly sold in 1847.
HISTORY OF Winnebago COUNTY 451
June 3, 1858 the wife and seven children of Rev. Mr. Illsley, pastor of the Congregational Church, were killed or drowned. In building the Madison branch of the Chicago and Galena railroad, a high embankment had been thrown up at the crossing of the creek about half a mile above the village. The culvert was too small for the volume of water, and up to the afternoon of the day of the sad and awful death catastrophe, a pond two miles long, a half a mile in width, and from 25 to 30 feet in depth, had formed above the embankment. About midnight the culvert caved in, the embankment gave way and the water rushed down in one mighty torrent carrying away several houses in its maddened rush, among which was the brick house occupied by Mr. Illsley and family, which toppled over and buried beneath its ruins the mother and seven children. Mr. Illsley. who had lost a leg and was comparatively helpless, was carried by the flood nearly down to Rock River, where he caught in a tree and held on until he was found by L. W. Richardson, who waded in and carried him out. In the Roscoe Cemetery, near the northeast corner, the eight bodies of one family who had not all been united for some time till the day on which their death came, were buried in one day.
The first birth in the town was B. F. Richardson, son of Benjamin and Mary Ann Richardson, May 8, 1837. The first marriage, William H. Riley and Ruth Brown. The first death, William Hale, who was drowned in Rock river, at the mouth of North creek, June 27, 1837. The first store Was opened by Alvan Leland in the house of Albert Tuttle, 1838.
VILLAGE OF ROSCOE. -The history of the village of Roscoe is so closely interwoven that an attempted separate history would be a work of supererogation, all the pertinent and important events being recited above.
The town has about ten shops and stores, which supply the necessities of its 600 inhabitants. Mr. Win. M. Richardson began manufacturing plows here in 1854. He is now making a sulky plow that is well thought of. The Roscoe Mills began work here in 1847; James Thompson, proprietor. In 1867 he sold out to Roberts & Stoner. Gristing is the principal work, in which rye bears no unimportant position.
R0SC0E LODGE. No. 75, A. F. ~n A. M.-Organized in the fall of 1849. Officers: Geo. W. Smith, W. M; A. Collier, S. W.; J. M Rhodes, J. W.; E. H. Crandall. Treas.; A. T. Clark, Secy. Number of members, 65. Meets Tuesday evening, on or before the full moon.
BAND OF HOPE LODGE, No. 85, I. 0. G. T-Organized February. 1871. Officers: Frank Sturtevant, W. C. T.; Miss Hattie Hobart, W. V. T.; Josiah Mabie, R. S.; Miss Alice Curtis, F. S.; Miss L. E. Ransom, Treas. Number of members, 70. Meets Saturday evenings.
