Prairie Speculators

david hunterOne of the many joys of Midewin is walking in the footsteps of those who came before. Like David Hunter. Like most of the original landowners in the lands that comprise Midewin, he was a speculator from Chicago. Unlike most of his fellow speculators, he not only held on to his original land purchase for a longer time, he actually expanded his holdings. Even as he re-entered the army and eventually pre-empted President Lincoln in freeing the slaves.

With the help of Lorin Schab, executive director of the Midewin Heritage Alliance, I’ve identified the succession of landowners on select parcels at Midewin, from the mid-1830’s through 1940 when all of the landowners were compelled to sell their land to the federal government to establish the largest and most sophisticated arsenal in the world.

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Much of South Patrol Road Prairie – the largest and oldest restoration area at Midewin – was owned originally by David Hunter. A graduate of West Point, Colonel Hunter first arrived in Chicago in 1824. Posted at Fort Dearborn, he met and became engaged to Maria Kinzie, daughter of John Kinzie, one of the pioneer settlement’s most wealthy and respected businessmen. After several postings elsewhere throughout the Midwest, Hunter resigned his commission, returned to Chicago, married his fiancée, and went into business with his brother-in-law.

On the heels of investing in the building of the most luxurious hotel in Chicago – the Lake House Hotel – in 1836 Hunter joined fellow speculators in gobbling up land all along the proposed route of the Illinois & Michigan Canal. Hunter began with 320 acres in Section 14 of Wilmington Township. Soon thereafter, he acquired the balance of the section, bringing his total acreage to 640.

A year later, the national economy collapsed, largely due to rampant land speculation. (Sound familiar?) Hunter held onto his Wilmington land for a while longer – likely leasing it for cattle pasturage since Will County then was an up an coming dairy region – but sought to secure his future by returning to the army.

Following nearly 20 uneventful years in the paymaster corps, in 1860 he wrote to a presidential candidate by the name of A. Lincoln, warning him of potential threats against his life. In return for his concern, Hunter was among those who accompanied president-elect Lincoln on his two-week train ride to be inaugurated in Washington.

david hunter 2Following the outbreak of the Civil War, Hunter was awarded command of a brigade of New York Volunteers. According to some military historians, the lack of troops – underpinned by his punishing approach to war and his abolitionist leanings – led to his issuing a military general order freeing the slaves in Georgia, Florida and South Carolina; an order that was promptly rescinded by President Lincoln.

Following the war, Hunter accompanied the body of Lincoln back to Springfield, where the slain president would rest following his assassination by John Wilkes Booth. Thereafter, Hunter was appointed to head up the military court to try the remaining conspirators, resulting in four being hanged and four being sent to prison.

General Hunter never set foot in Illinois again. When he died at the age of 83 in 1886, his 640 acres of Wilmington pastureland had been broken up. Maybe it was John Bovee who first planted the hedgerows to keep his cattle out of the fields owned by R. R. Clark. Maybe it was Edward Collins or his son James Collins, who added yet more hedgerows. Or John P. Kelly. Or Frank Shields. Or R.C. Maley.

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What we do know is that the cottonwood trees that grew up along those hedgerows began growing once the army took control of the property. We know this by counting the rings in those trees that were cut down this past winter. Many of the larger trees have around 70 rings, which dates them to early 1940 – the year the arsenal was established.

Removing the hedgerow trees and all of their brushy undergrowth is part of the on-going effort to open up the landscape and return it to the way it looked when Hunter first paid $1.25 an acre to own a piece of it.

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