Book Description
Excerpt from Historical Sketch of Jersey County, Illinois: Delivered at Jerseyville, July 4th, 1878 Within the current year, an editorial in the Christian Union expressed some surprise at the idea of the great West participating to any great extent in the rejoicings of our Nations Centennial, because the West had only been settled and developed within the last fifty years. It would, perhaps, excite a smile to assure the learned writer, that on the score of antiquity Illinois is but very little behind Plymouth Rock, and that the smoke of Saratoga had barely settled when a conquest for the American arms was achieved, without shedding a drop of blood, which added territory as great in extent as the inhabited area of the original thirteen colonies. Ninety-eight years ago to-day, Col. George Rogers Clark, with one hundred and fifty-three men, acting under commission from Patrick Henry, then Governor of Virginia, captured Fort Gage and the village of Kaskaskia from the British, and thereby ended forever the rule of England in the Valley of the Mississippi. It is not my purpose to dwell on Jthe particular incidents of this expedition. When I think of the audacity of the design, the small means at command, the hardihood displayed, with the splendor of the result, I can sympathize fully with the sentiment of Joe Daviess, when speaking of Clark and his achievements: When I think of this I feel like Moses at the burning bush Put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground. J-Kaskaskia, Cahokia, and Vincennes fell successively into the- hands of the conqueror, and an empire was redeemed from the Jbaleful influence of British rule. True, Vincennes, while held by a sergeant and one private, was recaptured by Lieut.-Gov. Hamilton the British hairbuyer, as he was called by the long-knives; but in February following, Clark marched across the country and retook the il post, and Lieut.-Gov. Hamilton with it. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.