THE STORY NOW about to be related, although well-authenticated, has never yet been told, so far as the writer is
aware, in a history of Pike county. The incidents of the story have been vouched for in bygone days by such eminent
pioneer authorities as General Murray McConnell, noted pleader in the early Pike county courts at Coles' Grove
and Atlas and fifth auditor of the treasury under President Buchanan; by John McConnell, who in his "Western
Characters" wove the circumstances into his story of "The First Grave"; by Judge Henderson, chronicler
of early Sangamon country history; and by Charles M. Eames, author of "Historic Morgan," compiled in
1884-85. The story has its dramatic climax within the present borders of Pike county and is closely interwoven
with the fortunes of the Edward Boone descendants, the Elledges and the Scholls, in the country of the Illinois.
In the fall of the year 1820, a small cart bearing a Kentuckian and his family pushed forward into the wilds of
the valley of the Illinois. This Kentuckian was Abraham Williams Keller, who, in this new land, dropped his surname
of Keller and became known on the border as Abe Williams.
Williams soon became an object of suspicion among the settlers. Stock disappeared from the open range; cabins were
plundered in the absence of their owners. Williams alone seemed to prosper, while others grew poorer. The first
Elledges and the first Scholls were among the victims of these border depredations.
In the spring of 1822, there came up another on the great trail from Kentucky, an aged gentleman, reputedly wealthy,
a friend of the Elledge and Scholl families, a Dr. Lewis G. Newell. Dr. Newell located in a log cabin near the
mouth of the Mauvaisterre, just above Philips (then Garret Van Dusen's) Ferry. Word passed through the settlement
that this newcomer had money.
Williams had been living at Camp's Grove, in the valley of the Mauvaisterre, on a claim purchased from one Collins.
He now left that location and moved into a camp close by Newell's. As stated, his conduct had already aroused the
suspicion of the settlement. His place had become known as a depot for the bad men of the border, some of them
suspected of being in league with the notorious Murrel gang that robbed Abraham Scholl of $1,000 in gold when he
was bringing his family to Illinois in 1825. Villainous, desperate men these were, men described by the early historian
in the words of St. Paul as "certain lewd fellows of the baser sort," among them John Cottrell and the
two Percifields, Henry and his brother Jerry, the latter the eldest and by far the worst being responsible for
bringing up to the settlement two barrels of whiskey, the first of the stuff brought into this region after the
settlement by the whites.
Williams became suddenly rich; horses, cattle and household goods in abundance surrounded him. The idle and the
profligate frequented his place. Drinking, gambling, horse racing and horse stealing, pocket pickings, robberies
and all their concomitants became common. Williams' Grove became suspected as the hiding place of stolen goods.
Search was made; stolen goods found. But in the rude justice court the accused were allowed to testify in each
other's behalf, and clear each other; there were no convictions.
Dr. Newell one day left his cabin above Van Dusen's Ferry to go to St. Louis. While he was gone, his house was
broken into by parties disguised as Indians. A chest was taken from it, broken open, and the money extracted. Williams
then moved over the river and occupied the first cabin in the McGee Creek country, in Pike county, which then reached
to the Wisconsin line and the shores of Lake Michigan. Here, in the fastnesses which sheltered desperadoes and
roving bands of redskins, Williams and his family took up their remote abode.
Meanwhile, incited by the exigencies of the situation, there had arisen a band of law-enforcers known as the "Regulators
of the Valley." Except for the rude justice court, the law had not yet come to the valley. Determined men,
mostly Kentuckians of the early settlement, among them the early Elledges and Scholls, banded themselves into a
secret and masked band to rescue the border from the lawlessness that was becoming unbearable.
The circumstances surrounding the robbery of Newell were so strong that the Regulators decided to take a hand.
Williams was accused. A meeting was called. At this meeting it was determined that the case demanded action. The
man who presided over the meeting (believed to have been Edward Boone's grandson, Jesse Bryan Scholl, who had married
Jesse Bryan Elledge's daughter Charity) concluded, according to Judge Henderson: "My friends, it is time these
rascals were punished and it is our duty to punish them."
Some resolute men (volunteers) were then selected "to see that the law was enforced." A compact was drawn
up and signed by the volunteers. Each was sworn to secrecy as to the identity of every other. Then they adjourned
to meet the following evening at sunset, at the "Bluff," near the spot where later stood the residence
of Washington Sears, east and north from present Valley City.
Promptly at the appointed place and hour, the Regulators met to perform their mission. Just after nightfall the
little party set out from the bluff for the river. They had more than eight miles to travel, over a country entirely
destitute of roads, cut up by numerous sloughs and ponds, with a considerable river to cross, and after that several
miles of the way through a dense and pathless forest.
Heading the band of resolute volunteers was a certain vainglorious but weak-kneed "twilight knight" by
the name of James H. Pistol, who occupied a cabin where Exeter now is and who was known along the border as "Captain
Pistol." Suddenly, as the little band was crossing the bottoms, the doughty captain became deathly sick in
his stomach (or so he pretended) and fell writhing to the ground. It was apparent to all that the man had no stomach
for Williams' rifle, known to be a killer. The captain urged the band to choose another in his place and go on
with the work in hand; that he would join them later if the pain passed.
Left thus leaderless, the band paused to deliberate upon another leader. At this instant, a "hail" came
out of the darkness. "Who is there?" challenged the sentinel. "A friend," came the answer,
and a mysterious stranger, who had become known on the border as the "Wild Hunter of the Prairie," stepped
into the circle of light made by the flickering lanterns.
This man had appeared suddenly on the frontier, at about the time that Dr. Newell came. He, too, hailed from Kentucky,
from the region whence came the Elledges and the Scholls; it is believed that they knew both his name and his mission
in this western land.
The Wild Hunter's movements had been mysterious; one day he was in one part of the settlement, the next day in
another. He visited every household except that of Williams. He was a singular sort of person, yet a good type
of the daring backwoodsman of the period. His leathern hunting-shirt trailed almost to his knees, decorated with
fringes of various lengths; his pantaloons were of the same material; on his feet were deerskin moccasins; on his
head an enormous catamount skin; at his side a hunting-knife of frightful length.
Once, as Williams and Jerry Percifield had been crossing the prairie they beheld the mysterious roamer of the wilderness.
"There," said Jerry, spying him, "is the Wild Hunter; did you ever see him?" Before Williams
could reply, the Wild Hunter himself strode before him: "Abraham, do you know me?" inquired the hunter.
His stern voice and sterner glance seemed to chill the very heart of the cowardly Williams. His cheek paled, his
knees smote together and he trembled like a leaf. Percifield, after the tragic sequel, recounted the story of Williams'
fright.
"What's the matter?" inquired Percifield, noting his friend's demeanor. "Do you know the man? If
so, come forward and speak for yourself."
"Abraham, you know me well," said the stranger. "You know, too, that I am acquainted with your foul
and dark deeds. Your ill-gotten wealth shall avail you little. Before many days pass by, I will see you again,
when circumstances are different, and times more favorable than now." With these words, the mysterious hunter
turned on his heel and immediately was out of sight, vanishing in a neighboring grove.
Williams, alarmed by the Wild Hunter's threat which he sensed in his parting words, immediately afterward abandoned
his location above Van Dusen's Ferry and took up his abode across the river in the wild McGee Creek country.
The Wild Hunter, stepping out of the night into the light cast by the lanterns of the volunteers, proceeded at
once to the business in hand. "Grant-like," says the historian, "his speech was short and to the
point." "My friends," said he, "I know all your intentions. I have overheard your conversations.
There is nothing hid from me. Williams is my enemy; I am his. Why it is so, it is not interest for you to know.
Suffice it to say that in years gone by he has planted a dagger in the heart of my domestic peace. He did me an
injury I am bound to avenge. You, I have observed, are without a leader. Will you accept the services of a true
soldier?"
At once, the Regulators accepted the proffered service. Led by the Wild Hunter, they threaded the dark wilderness,
arriving near midnight at the Williams cabin, which they surrounded. Hearing their approach and supposing the house
was being surrounded by Indians, Williams seized his rifle and appeared at the door of his cabin, threatening to
shoot the first who came inside the low rail fence that surrounded the cabin clearing.
As the cry of "Indians! Indians!" Was raised within the house, Williams, with ready gun, stepped from
the door. Immediately he was confronted by the mysterious captain. Williams threw his gun to position:
"Thomas G---! Stand back or I will blow you down," he screamed. "Fire! Fire!" shouted the Regulators
from all sides, in warning to their captain. The hammer of Williams' rifle fell; it snapped, missed fire. Simultaneously,
a flash of fire lit the darkness and the report of the Wild Hunter's rifle echoed through the forest. "I am
a dead man, Thomas G---. You have taken my life," exclaimed the dying Williams, as he sank just outside his
cabin door.
Silently, horrified by the sudden tragic turn of events, the Regulators gathered around the dying man and gazed
spellbound upon his convulsed limbs and twitching muscles. Then a woman's wild screams once more aroused the forest
echoes, as Williams' wife, in her night-dress, with flying disheveled hair, rushed from the cabin and threw herself
upon the body of the dying man. "Oh, you devils! You devils! You have killed my husband," she screamed.
"I knew it would come to this; it all comes from associating with those drunken thieves, Henry and Jerry.
Murder! Murder! Stand back, you black-looking monsters! I will see my husband. O, dear, O, dear!"
Silently, with no trace of emotion, the Wild Hunter picked up the body of the fallen Williams, and assisted by
one or two of the others, carried the dead man to a grassy spot on the left bank of McGee, where the body was laid
down. "My friends," said the Wild Hunter, addressing those who had followed him, "the deed is done.
We cannot now recall it. I did it in self-defense. I have rid the world of a monster and myself of an inveterate
foe. My conscience acquits me, so I regret not the act. My advice to each of you is to go your way and I will go
mine. You will never see me again. Let every man guard well his secret, and none other will know that you were
here."
Then, by the "struggling moonbeams' misty light, and the lanterns dimly burning," they buried the first
white man that ever settled in the valley of the Mauvaisterre, in the "first grave in the valley."
Says Charles M. Eames, in "Historic Morgan," 1885:
"As near as we can learn, the site of the grave was on the left bank of McGee's creek, in the county of Pike.
Around that grave the weeds and grass grow in rich profusion. The winds of heaven sweep over it, and the wolf,
unconscious of its existence, sets up its midnight howl by its side. No gaudy pillar or flattering epitaph points
out to the traveler the spot of earth where lie the bones of the pioneer of the Mauvaisterre."
Said Judge Henderson in 1874: "Often while paddling a canoe up this stream (McGee), the place where he lies
buried has been pointed out to me. John McConnell, with whom I had read law, always told me that the grave of Williams
was the first grave in that part of the Illinois Valley. He so styles it in his ‘Western Characters,' also dating
the death of Williams in the fall of 1821. He obtained from his father (Gen. Murray McConnell) the facts connected
with the ‘regulating' of Williams, whom he called by the fictitious name of ‘Cutler,' and wove them into the story
of ‘The First Grave.' The facts are in the main correct; he dates his arrival in 1819 and death in 1821, but there
was no settler in 1819. He arrived in the fall of 1820, and Dr. Newell in the spring of 1822, in which year the
death of Williams occurred."
The name of the "Wild Hunter of the Prairie" was never revealed in the Illinois country, which he quitted
immediately after the death of Williams, and to which he never returned. A few there were who knew him, and what
his mission was; from one of these the historian Eames learned his name, but at the time Eames wrote his history
in 1884-85 he preferred not to reveal it, for the reason that members of the Wild Hunter's family were at that
time still living in the state of Kentucky. The name of the Wild Hunter thus died with Eames, doubtless the last
of those in the Illinois country who knew it.