UNDER THE OLD FLAG

VOLUME I

INTRODUCTION

Family Boyhood-West Point-Panama-Washington Territory-Return to the East.

My family name, Wilson, is of Anglo-Danish origin and is found wherever English-speaking people and their descendants are living. It belongs to the self-evoluting class and generally implies nothing closer than clanship. It has been known in the States from the earliest days.

My own forbears first settled in Tidewater, Virginia, whence they spread to Spottsylvania and Culpeper Counties, thence over the Blue Ridge into the valley regions, and finally to Kentucky and the alluring West. My father, Harrison Wilson, was the eldest son of Alexander Wilson and his wife, Elinor Harrison. He was born near Front Royal, Virginia, in 1789. His mother, through Thomas Harrison, was connected with the Harrisons of the James River country. She was famed for her courtly manners and amiable character.

Alexander Wilson's father was Isaac Wilson, for three years a sergeant in Captain Augustine Tabb's company of the Second Virginia state line, com

manded by Colonel William Brent. His wife was Margaret Gordon, daughter of John Gordon and Barbara Cullom, evidently of Scotch origin.

My paternal ancestors, as far back as we can trace them, originating in and coming from Northumberland, part of ancient Bernicia, intermarried with the leading families of the Old Dominion and took an active part in all that concerned its growth and welfare. But, like many Virginians, Isaac Wilson with his brothers, sons, and nephews who were ruined by the War of Independence, wisely concluded that it would be easier to rebuild their homes and mend their fortunes in a new country than in the old, and consequently, as soon as they could manage it, after the Revolution, emigrated to Kentucky.

After settling with his family in the Blue Grass country near the present city of Lexington, Alexander Wilson and his brother Thornton went on to the Ohio River, where the former opened a considerable farm near a shipping point known as Raleigh, a few miles below the mouth of the Wabash.

Shortly afterward the general government owning the Illinois salines laid out Shawneetown on the Ohio River in the southeastern corner of the territory as the landing and entrepôt of the Salt Works. The place grew rapidly into the most important settlement of that region. My grandfather living nearby, naturally became one of the first settlers, and through his kinsman, General Harrison, then governor of the territory, received a grant of the ferry-right both ways across the Ohio, which, after his death in 1814, was confirmed to his heirs by the unanimous vote of the Illinois legislature. It came in due course, by inheritance and purchase, to my

brother and myself and after a hundred years is still operated under lease from us.

Alexander Wilson, evidently a notable citizen, was in 1812 elected a member of the first American legislature ever convened in Illinois, and as chairman of several of its principal committees exercised a controlling influence not only in selecting, framing, and passing laws for the new territory, but in providing for its defence against the British emissaries and their savage allies. Shortly after the session of 1813 my grandfather died, but my father, instead of leaving his body in a French graveyard at Kaskaskia, removed it to Shawneetown, and, as was the custom, buried it on the paternal farm in Kentucky.

Harrison Wilson was at that time just reaching man's estate. Although quite a lad when his family left Virginia, he remembered but little of it except that he had been taken to Alexandria by his father to call on General Washington, and that the general had kindly patted him on the head while making a neighborly inquiry as to his mother's health.

My father, of course, shared the travels and hardships of his family, with but little time and less opportunity for education beyond that given by his mother and father. He had a few terms from the peripatetic schoolmaster of the settlements, and, being intelligent and fond of reading, although books were scarce and newspapers unknown on the frontier, became a man of more than average attainments.

At the outbreak of the second war with Great Britain, Harrison Wilson was commissioned ensign September 17, 1812, in Captain Thomas E. Craig's company of Frontier Riflemen, and took part in an expedition of two keel boats by the Illinois River to

Fort Crève-Cœur, near the present city of Peoria, for the purpose of breaking up the liquor traffic and overawing the Indian allies of the British. The boats were armed with swivels and blunderbusses and were impenetrable to rifle bullets. The expedition, lasting four months, was so successful that Captain Craig was promoted to major of the Fourth Territorial Regiment, while my father, although only twenty-two, was made captain April 17, 1813, to fill the vacancy. Although no part of the regiment was again called into service, he continued his connection with it, and after the establishment of peace became its colonel.

Although a farmer, stock-raiser, and trader to New Orleans, my father was elected county treasurer and sheriff in turn and led a busy and active life till the Black Hawk War took him again into the army as captain of Illinois Mounted Volunteers, first regiment, first brigade. His company, containing many of the leading citizens of Gallatin County, was mustered into the service May 15, and discharged August 12, 1832.

During the brief campaign which followed, my father made the acquaintance of Winfield Scott, Zachary Taylor, Jefferson Davis, Albert Sidney Johnston, and Joseph E. Johnston, all of whom were serving at that time in Illinois as officers of the regular army. He also met Captain Abraham Lincoln and the leading officers of the territorial forces.

After this campaign, the last against the Indians east of the Mississippi, my father settled down and led an uneventful life to the end. On the outbreak of the Mexican War, he offered a regiment of volunteers from the lower counties of the state, but as

only six were needed, his offer was declined with the assurance of the governor that if another were required his regiment should be taken.

The decade after the Mexican War was a turbulent one in southeastern Illinois. The closing of the salt works had let loose a large number of rough operatives, white and black. Gambling, drinking, horse-racing, and gun-fighting prevailed, the slavery question came to the front as it had done once before, and kidnapping became common along the border of the slave states. Among the first victims was a colored girl who had belonged to the Wilson family. She was taken to New Orleans and sold to a planter on the Red River, but as soon as she could be located my father went for her, and, after much legal formality and trouble, brought her home in triumph. After a similar service in another case of the same sort, which aroused the public conscience, under his leadership, he had the satisfaction of seeing all forms of violence vindicated and the rowdies and kidnappers brought to punishment or driven out of the state.

But my father's career was drawing to a close. Although a man of extraordinary activity and endurance, he fell sick, and, after a lingering illness, died February 9, 1852, at the age of 63. He was always independent in politics and never forgot that he was a Virginian. He was twice married. His first wife was a daughter of Andrew Waggoner, a Virginian, who had settled in Union County, Kentucky. She died early, leaving one son, John Andrew, who removed to Hamilton County, where he became sheriff, a member of the legislature, and a leading merchant. He had several children, the old