That great preacher, Dr. David Nelson, came in 1829. I remember going to the Baptist church and the preacher in his discourse said: Well, brethren, I have just found out what that great beast spoken of in the Bible is. It is Dr. Nelson. And his sabbath school and temperance are his two horns.' I attended Dr. Nelson's first camp-meeting, held a few miles from Palmyra, and it was a glorious meeting. When I got on the ground there was only one cabin built. A large congregation had assembled. At the close of the service that evening some of the brethren asked Dr. Nelson to go home with them. He said, 'No, I came to a camp-meeting and intend to stay on the ground.' Some bed clothes were spread on the ground in the cabin and Dr. Nelson and I spent the night there. After we got through talking I remember the Doctor scraping up some chips and making a light; then taking out his bible and studying up his sermon for the next day. And he preached a powerful sermon and a great many confessed Jesus Christ as their only Savior. The meeting lasted several days and at the close there were, I think, sixty or seventy united with the church. This was in the fall of 1832. In 1833 I attended Dr. Nelson's camp-meeting at Capt. Bird's farm, a few miles west of Hannibal. I had sold my farm and was preparing to move to Illinois, but desired to attend the meeting. So I got my wagon loaded and with wife and children went. When we got there a few were already getting ready seats and a stand. I told them the Doctor would not speak from the stand they had made. While we were talking Dr. Nelson came up and tapping me on the shoulder said: Brother Patterson, go and fix me a place to preach from. I won't go on that scaffold. I want to be down among the people.' Pointing to Captain Bird's cabin he asked whose it was and when told said, the Lord intends to convert that man's soul.' And sure enough before the meeting ended Capt. Bird joined the church and some fifty or sixty others, including my wife and half-sister." In a large historic sense it has been said that people is happy whose

annals are uninteresting; and all his life Col. Patterson cared more for his quiet religious life and church work than for any of the other experiences that came to him in his pioneer and public career. In 1833 he moved with his family to Irish Grove, Sangamon County, Illinois. It was characteristic of him that the first thing he thought about when he got there was that there was no Presbyterian church. Pretty soon he had one there and a stated preacher. In 1836 he sold his Illinois farm and moved to West Point, Lee County, Iowa, then in the Territory of Wisconsin. In the autobiographical notes we have alluded to he said: "In 1837 the West Point church was organized by Rev. Samuel Wilson, of Monmouth, Illinois and Rev. L. G. Bell, of Iowa, with ten members, the first organized Old School Presbyterian church in the Territory of Iowa. I was elected an elder, and James Ewing our pastor. Gov. Lucas was appointed governor of the Territory of Iowa and ordered an election. I was elected to the legislature and the first meeting of that body was in 1838-9 at at Burlington. I was several times elected and served in both houses nine years. I was appointed Colonel by Gov. Lucas and commanded by Gen. Brown to raise a regiment armed and equipped to protect our boundary line between Iowa and Missouri. While our legislature was in session I got a resolution passed asking the authorities of Clark County, Mo., to cease hostilities until Congress could establish the true boundary line. With three other members of the legislature I was appointed to take the resolutions and present them to the county judges at Waterloo, Clark County, Mo., who had got Gov. Bogg of Missouri to order out some 10,000 men. There were at that time 700 men under command of Col. Allen at Waterloo, and 1,500 on the march from Palmyra. After a whole day's pleading with the judges the court passed an order that they had no farther business with the militia. So the border war ended and Congress established the line in favor of Iowa." Col. Patterson moved to Keokuk from West Point at a comparatively early day. He was a member of the

State Constitutional Convention that met in Iowa City in 1857 and framed the present Constitution of the State. President Pierce made him postmaster at Keokuk unsolicited and President Buchanan reappointed him. He was several times a member of the city council and three times mayor of Keokuk. In 1864 he was one of the vice-presidents of the National Democratic Convention at Chicago. For many

years as head of the packing firm of Patterson & Timberman he was one of the business kings of the Upper Mississippi Valley. He was a man of large body and brain, with little or no education save what his wise and vigorous common sense had drawn from his experience of life. He was a man of great goodness as well as wisdom, and wherever he was men recognized that he was a potential and commanding man. For years before his death the congregation of the Westminster Presbyterian Church in Keokuk, probably the strongest single church society in the State, manifested towards him a filial regard and reverence, which was a beautiful witness of his goodness and wisdom. His life and character were like a granite shaft, simple, strong, imposing, enduring.

Hawkins Taylor, who knew his earlier life better than any one now living, contributes to the RECORD the following: WASHINGTON, D. C., March 24, 1890.

EDITOR HISTORICAL RECORD:

When a good man dies it is proper that a record of his life should be perpetuated in the records of his country as a pathway to usefulness and honor to the boys and young men growing up to take the place of their elders.

Col. Wm. Patterson, of Keokuk, who on the 23d of October, 1889, passed from this to a better world, was of the truly good men. For more than fifty years he was a citizen of Lee County, and during all that time was honored and respected by all, as an honest, worthy Christian citizen of great per

sonal popularity, and while not ambitious to hold office he did hold many. He was a member of the House in the first two Legislatures of the Territory of Iowa, and was again a member of the House in the fourth and fifth Assemblies, and was then a member of the Council of the sixth Assembly and again a member of the House in the eighth Assembly; was a member of the Constitutional Convention that framed the present Constitution of the State. He was an alderman of the fourth ward in Keokuk for 1856-7-8 and was mayor of the city since.

Col. Patterson was a Democrat, but as lawmaker he knew no party, and while not a public speaker he always exerted great influence in all the relations of his life, whether in the legislature, convention, church matters, or in business. His whole life was that of activity in business, and his fairness, honesty and levelheadedness, always on the side of good government and good morals, gave him great respect and influ

ence.

It was my good fortune to have known Col. Patterson for more than sixty-five years, and up to 1862 living in the same county with him and for a year or more making his home my home in Missouri. From Missouri we went to Illinois, and from Illinois to Iowa together, settling in West Point, and the first thing done was to build a log school house at West Point, large enough for preaching in on Sundays when a preacher could be had. There was no church organization then (in 1836) in the village. All denominations had the same rights in that school house.

The Presbyterians of West Point, mainly the colony from Illinois, organized a Presbyterian church, the first one organized in the Territory. Col. Patterson was an elder. The old pastor in Illinois was made pastor and given a pleasant parsonage and then was built a comfortable brick church, Col. Patterson being the active spirit and most liberal giver of the needful funds for these good works.

Col. Patterson's ancestors were of the large immigration of Scotch-Irish Presbyterians that settled in Virginia at an early

date, and that contributed so much to the early greatness of that State, and that occupied so conspicuous a place in the Revolution.

When Col. Patterson was a very small boy his father, Capt. Joseph Patterson, moved with his family to Adair County, Kentucky. Capt. Patterson brought considerable means with him. He was a very enterprising citizen and at one time was supposed to be the wealthiest man in the County. He was every body's friend and endorser, and unfortunately, like many other good men of those days, became financially embarrassed, so that when hard times came on, not being able to meet his debts, mostly surety debts, and his friends, that could otherwise have helped him, failing, the Captain still had the good sense to realize his condition, and turned over to his son William, then little more than a boy, all that he had, stipulating that one thousand dollars be paid to his unmarried daughter by his first wife when she married, (he had given the same sum to each of his five other daughters when they had married), and that he and his wife and a young daughter by his second wife (a noble worthy woman) should be cared for during their lives. There was no friend that believed that Billy, boy as he was, could pay the debts, and save anything, but Billy went at it in earnest, and he had no enemies and had the people's confidence, and kind friendship and help. He bought horses on time and drove them South and sold them, made money, and year by year he paid the old debts until they were all paid. The sister married, and she got her dower as stipulated. In the meantime the Colonel married Ellen Johnson, the daughter of his step-mother, who made him a noble helpmate, and from whom he was separated by her death but a few years. During this time he had his father, step-mother and younger sister, and a sister and a brother of his wife to care for.

In 1830 he sold out in Kentucky and moved to Missouri and bought him a farm, and the first thing he did was to build a comfortable home for his father, mother and sister near his