Chapters from Illinois History

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: II. Col. John Todd's Record-book The early records of The Illinois, as the region including our State was formerly called, unfortunately have not been preserved. Those of its civil and judicial administration, during the sixty years of its organized government as a royal province, and the subsequent period of its existence as a county of Virginia, would be of exceeding value to him who shall properly write the history of Illinois. A large collection of such papers remained at Kaskaskia, once the capital, successively, of Province, Territory, and State, until the day came when the ancient village was obliged to yield even the honor of being a county-seat to the neighboring city of Chester. To the latter place, several boxes filled with these papers were then removed, and stood for years in the hall of its courthouse, until, by neglect or wanton misuse, their contents were lost or destroyed. One, however, of these mementoes of the past, and not the least in worth among them, was recently found in an office of this courthouse, in a receptacle for fuel, just in time to save it from the fiery fate of many of its companions, and is now in the custody of the Chicago Historical Society. This is the original Record or Minute-Book of Col. John Todd, the first civil governor of the Illinois country. When George Rogers Clark had captured the British posts beyond the Ohio, under the authority of Virginia, that State was quick to act for the preservation of the rights thus acquired. Kaskaskia was taken on the 4th of July, 1778; the first surrender of Vincennes, or St. Vincent, as it was sometimes called, occurred soon after; and in October, of the same year, the General Assembly of Virginia passed An Act for establishing the County ofIllinois, and for the more effectual protection and ...