FAIREST OF ABRAHAM SCHOLL'S daughters was the girl Adeline, a noted beauty of the early settlement. Her sprightliness
and charm were such as made her the belle of every festal occasion in pioneer days. According to stories handed
down in the Peter Scholl family and recalled now by Jacob E. Scholl of Chicago, several noted gallants here in
the west sought Adeline's favor. According to Scholl, a scion of the house of Yates, that gave two governors to
the state, was among her admirers. On Griggsville Prairie and in the early ballrooms along the Philips Ferry road,
she queened it over all.
Adeline, according to Scholl descendants, became engaged to young Benjamin L. Matthews, who with his parents, John
B. and Margaret (Leach) Matthews, crossed the Illinois river at Philips Ferry on the same day as the Scholls, May
17, 1825. The Scholl and Matthews families settled in the same neighborhood and a close friendship existed between
the two families throughout the pioneer period. Numerous of the stories recounted of Abraham Scholl in these chapters
have been from the relations of Captain Benjamin L. Matthews, hero of the Civil War, who in 1826- 27 was courting
Abraham's daughter Adeline.
Descendants of the house of Scholl do not know what interrupted the romance of this pioneer pair. Adeline, in 1828,
married another of her suitors, and a year later Benjamin married another Kentucky girl, Minerva Carrington, daughter
of Asa and Lucinda Carrington. They became the parents of the noted Colonel Asa C. Matthews of Pittsfield. Asa
Matthews and John LeGrande Wilson, Matilda Scholl's son, attended the old Shelley school (north of Griggsville)
together.
Adeline Scholl married Henry C. Bushnell, a dashing Green Mountain youth, April 10, 1828. She was then 21, having
been born in Clark county, Kentucky, in 1807. They were married by Garret Van Dusen, then a Pike county justice
of the peace. Van Dusen was an eccentric Knickerbocker Dutchman who was one of the earliest settlers in the Blue
Creek country east of Pittsfield, and was the originator of a queer device set up on Blue Creek to crack corn and
operated much after the manner of the first mill in the days of Adam and Eve. He also operated the first rude ferry
at the old Philips Ferry site on the Illinois river.
The marriage license issued by William Ross, then clerk of the county commissioners' court at Atlas, the early
county seat, to Henry Bushnell and Adeline Scholl was the eleventh marriage license issued in Pike county. A total
of 19 marriage license was issued in the county in 1828, as against six the preceding year.
The Bushnells, of whom there were several brothers, hailed from Vermont. One of them, Salmon Bushnell, appears
in a very early day on the bank of the Illinois river in Calhoun county, at what was known as Bushnell's Ferry,
site of present Kampsville. Salmon Bushnell was located at that point and operating a ferry there when there was
but one other white man in what is now Crater Precinct, in which early Farrowtown, now Kampsville, is located.
This other settler was Jacob Crader.
On October 29, 1829, in Pike county, two of the Bushnells, Salmon and Daniel, married, in a double wedding, Mary
Ann and Parthenia Norris, sisters of Thomas K. Norris, who married Louisa (Scholl) Key. The Norris sisters were
relatives of the wife of Nimrod Philips. John Garrison, an elder of the Christian church, said the ceremonies in
the double wedding, the first of record in Pike county.
Henry Bushnell was a civil engineer and surveyor. He was one of the founders of and started the first business
in what is now the town of Bushnell in McDonough county, Illinois. Scholl descendants say they have seen differing
accounts of the origin of the town's name but that they know beyond a doubt that the town of Bushnell took its
name from Abraham Scholl's son-in-law. Bushnell also helped lay out the town of Vermont, in Logan county, naming
that town after his native state.
The Bushnells ‘finally sold out in Illinois and moved to Beetown, in Grant county, in the then Territory of Wisconsin.
Grant county joins Jo Davies county, Illinois, on the south, and is adjacent to the famed lead mining region at
Galena. Bushnell engaged in lead mining across the line in Wisconsin Territory and is said to have become wealthy.
J. E. Scholl of Chicago states that at one time the Bushnell cabin in Wisconsin was heavily stocked with gold,
nearly every crevice and cranny secreting the precious metal. The Bushnells died and are buried in Grant county,
Wisconsin, along with the family of Marshall and Sally (Scholl) Key.
The Bushnells had a daughter, Dotha, reputed to have been the first white child born in Grant county, in the then
wild Wisconsin Territory. Dotha Bushnell in after years married a Whipple and at the age of 65 was operating a
hotel business in San Francisco, California. They had also a son, J. Henry (Hank) Bushnell, who located in Brookings,
South Dakota, he being the only one of the Bushnells now living. Another son was Wesley Bushnell.
Henry and Adeline Bushnell had also a daughter, Lois, who married Matthew Edwards. They lived in Beetown, Wisconsin,
and died there. John Wilson of Baylis, 71, has pleasant memories of this granddaughter of Abraham Scholl. In the
late 1880s, John Wilson was in Grant county, Wisconsin, working for Abraham Key, a son of Sally Scholl Key. "I
was told," says Wilson, "to go see Lois Edwards and that when I had seen her I would have seen the best
woman in Wisconsin."
Lois Edwards had a son, Clinton Edwards, who was about John Wilson's age. John Wilson, Clint Edwards and three
grandsons of Sally Scholl Key, namely, Abe Patch (son of Nancy Key), Orlo Martin (son of Mary Key), and John Thompson
(son of Nin Key), were all about of an age and were much together when John Wilson was there in the latter 1880s.
The Edwards, Patch, Martin and Thompson families lived at Patch Grove, named for the Patch family.
Amanda Key, first daughter of Marshall and Sally Scholl Key, who was a baby when the Key family came with the Scholls
from Kentucky to Pike county in 1825, had two sons by her first husband, Frank Parrish, namely, Frank, Jr., and
Charles. Young Frank Parrish, great grandson of Abraham Scholl, became a prominent banker in Iowa. Orlo Martin
had a daughter, now Mrs. Richard Morrisey, and two sons, Jay and Milton, the former of whom has two sons and a
daughter, and the latter two daughters. Roy, youngest son, has two sons and two daughters.
John Wilson of Baylis spent some time with his Wisconsin relatives in 1886 and again in 1888 he spent a hundred
days there, working through the summer. He recalls having helped thresh stacked wheat for a man named Lord for
five days in December of 1886; when the warmest day was 20 below zero; and that to keep from freezing to death
he wore all his own clothes and a good share of his cousin Orlo Martin's.
Many of the descendants of Griggsville pioneers who went to Grant county in the Territory of Wisconsin in an early
day still live in or near those early settlements in southwestern Wisconsin. Numerous of Marshall and Sally (Scholl)
Key's descendants still reside there. Marshall Key, who married Abraham Scholl's daughter Sally, was a noted man
in early Griggsville. He kept the first tavern in the town and was prominent in the politics of the place, being
a leading Jacksonian Democrat of that day.
Marshall Key, a distant relative of Francis Scott Key, immortal author of the Star Spangled Banner, was descended
in a direct line from the royal English houses of Tudor. None in the early Griggsville community knew of this descent
and it is doubtful if Marshall Key himself ever suspected it. The genealogy of the Key family is a charming story
in itself.
The Keys in America are from an ancestral line that held sway in Wales in the 14th century. The earliest recorded
ancestor was Marydudd of Wales, who played a prominent part in the affairs of his country. His son, Ednyfed, was
also prominent but no dates are given. Those were days when people as a rule cared little for vital statistics.
Owen Tudor, first of the line found with a double name, married Catharine, daughter of Charles VI of France. She
married, first, King Henry V of England, and after his death she married Owen Tudor, a Welsh nobleman, by whom
she had one son, Edward Tudor, who married Margaret Beaufort, heiress of the House of Somerset and representative
of the junior branch of the line of John of Gaunt.
They were parents of Henry VII who founded the House of Tudor and was king of England 1485 to 1509. He was father
of King Henry VIII of England and of Lady Mary, who married, first, Louis XII of France, and second, Charles Brandon,
Duke of Suffolk. They had two daughters, the eldest, Lady Frances Brandon, who married Henry Grey, and they had
three daughters, Lady Jane (queen of England for nine days and then beheaded by Queen Mary), Lady Elizabeth, and
Lady Mary, who secretly married Thomas Key (sometimes spelled Keys, Keyes and Keye), sergeant-porter to Queen Elizabeth.
Of their children, one, Thomas, came to America in early pioneer days.
The exact date of the coming of this first Key to America is unknown, but it is known that he entered land in New
Kent county, Virginia, in the name of his wife Martha, this land grant being Warrant No. 66, Patent Book No. 1,
on file in Richmond, Virginia. This grant of 100 acres was to "Martha, the wife of Thomas Key of Warwich river,
planter," and was issued by "Francis West, Esqr., Govern. & Capt. Generil of Virginia," on the
"second day of December Anno Domini One Thousand six hundred twentie & eight and in the fowerth yeare
of the Raigne of our Soveraigne Charles by the Grace of God of England Scotland France & Ireland King defender
of the faith &C., and in twoe and twentieth yeare of this plantation."
Among the descendants of Thomas Key was John Key, who obtained Land Warrant No. 508, Book No. 6, dated April 8,
1674, in New Kent county, Virginia. He had a son, John Key, who entered land in Albemarle and Spottsylvania counties,
Virginia, founding a vast estate in Albemarle county near what is now Charlottesville, Virginia, on which he erected
what was known in those days as a gentleman's lodge, where he brought his friends to hunt game, this house being
pinned together and built entirely without nails. The lodge is still standing in a good state of preservation,
and a few years ago was owned and occupied by Richmond T. Minor and family.
From this John Key descended another John who lived in Albemarle county and was a neighbor and admirer of Thomas
Jefferson. He had several children, among them Price Key, a soldier of the Revolution, whose military history is
found in a widow's claim for pension No. 3021, he having enlisted from Spottsylvania county, Virginia, September
28, 1776. He was in the War for Independence until the last trumpet was blown and saw the surrender of the British
at Yorktown, October 19, 1781. In the winter of 1777-78 he endured the sufferings at Valley Forge with the Continental
troops. In an early day he moved to the then Territories of Tennessee and Kentucky, and reared his family there,
among them a Marshall Key. From this line was descended the Marshall Key who married Sally Scholl and came to the
Griggsville neighborhood with the Scholl family in 1825.
The royal arms of the Key family carry as a crest a griffin's head couped at the breast, wings endorsed argent,
holding in the beak a key. Motto: "Faithful and More Faithful."
A thrilling incident in early Griggsville history grew out of an election contest in 1838 between Marshall Key
and D. F. Coffey, candidates respectively of the Democratic and Whig parties. These were then the pro- and anti-
slavery parties. Key, coming from the slave state of Kentucky, was pro-slave. At the annual election that autumn
each party brought forth what it regarded as its strongest man for constable, then considered an office of high
importance. A hot contest ensued, resulting in the election of Coffey. The Key forces resented the result, alleging
fraud. Partisans of the opposing candidates came to blows, a Key man assaulting a Coffey man immediately after
the election, striking him in the back, a general melee ensuing but no one seriously hurt.
A few weeks later, a gentleman visited Griggsville, holding anti-slavery meetings and circulating a petition to
Congress asking that honorable body to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia, and the non-admission of Texas
as a state, the petition being first presented for signers at a religious meeting at the Methodist church. Prior
to closing the service, the minister gave notice that the petition was in the hands of a gentleman present and
that he would be pleased to have anyone so disposed, sign it. A number of persons walked forward and signed their
names. Others in the audience signified their disapproval. Excitement and passion ran high.
This historian of 1880 thus records what followed:
"They (the pro-slavery advocates) met in the saloon, known then as a ‘grocery,' where liquor was sold, and
passed resolutions that the parties who had signed that obnoxious petition should be compelled to erase their signatures
from it. To carry out this design, on the morning following the last anti-slavery meeting, they pursued the gentleman
who held the petition, overtaking him on the farm of J. K. Moore, and compelled him to produce the document. They
then returned and waited upon those parties whose names appeared upon the paper, and demanded of them that they
should immediately erase them, under the penalty of violence if they should refuse. Some complied with this demand,
but others did not.
"These disturbers of the peace then notified the obstinate ones that they must erase their names, and accordingly
appointed an evening to ‘finish up the business.' They again met in the same grocery to more fully complete their
organization, and ‘fire up.' The good people of the country being afraid of their maneuvers, came pouring into
town about twilight, well armed and equipped to act on the defensive. They met with the peaceable people of Griggsville
in the hotel and organized, appointing Mr. Blood (Amos Blood) as their Captain. A committee was also appointed
to confer with a committee of the other party, in which conference the committee from the citizens informed the
disturbers that they must immediately disband, or else they would be dealt with harshly, and that the first man
who dared to intimidate another petitioner would receive a fresh supply of ammunition.
"The disturbers then seeing the turn of affairs, decided to abide the decision of the citizens and immediately
disbanded. Thus ended what might have assumed the form of a riot, had it not been for the timely aid and energy
of the peaceful citizens of the neighborhood."
Marshall Key left Griggsville in 1841, going to the Territory of Wisconsin ans locating near Montford, in Grant
county. Subsequently he removed to Lancaster, and still later to Beetown. He and his family had been preceded to
Wisconsin Territory by the Bushnells and some of the early Griggsville Elledges, among them Banner Boone Elledge.
In the Territory, Marshall Key engaged in lead mining for many years, in those days the places above mentioned
producing large quantities of lead ore. Later, the Key family took up residence in Wyalusing township in Grant
county, where Marshall Key died in 1879. His widow, Sarah (Sally) Scholl Key, died in June, 1882; both are buried
there.
Numerous descendants of Marshall Key and Sally Scholl still live in Grant county, Wisconsin, and are identified
with the towns of Patch Grove, Bagley and Bloomington in that state. Marshall Key's son, Abraham Key, born in Griggsville
in 1835, became a leading citizen of Grant county and even in his old age was noted for his athletic powers. A
Wisconsin Commemorative Biographical Record, published in 1900, says of him:
"Abraham Key, one of the defenders of the Union during the Rebellion, and a representative citizen of Patch
Grove township, belongs to one of the pioneer families of Grant county and for many years was a resident of Wyalusing
township. He was born in Pike county, Ill., in 1835, his parents being Marshall and Sarah (Scholl) Key. The name
Key is a historic one, and some of the representatives of this family have attained to national fame. The branch
of the family to which Abraham Key belongs is along the same line of descent, though a little remote, as was Francis
Scott Key, the famous author of the ‘Star Spangled Banner.' Philip Barton Key, who was slain in Washington many
years ago by Gen. Sickles, was descended from the same ancestry."
The slaying of Philip Barton Key here referred to occurred on Sunday, February 27, 1859, just off Lafayette Square,
diagonally opposite the White House in Washington, D. C. Key, then United States District Attorney for the District
of Columbia, was shot to death by Daniel E. Sickles, then United States Congressman from New York, a Tammany leader,
and a former corporation counsel for the City of New York. The not inculpable cause of the fatal affray was Sickles'
pretty wife, the former Teresa Bagioli. Key was a ladies' man, tall, handsome, athletic, then about 40, a Southern
aristocrat of the first rank, in his veins the blood of the Lees, Calhouns and Pendletons, his father having already
made the family name immortal by his composition of what is now the national anthem. The shooting and the ensuing
trial of Sickles and his acquittal were among the greatest sensations in the gay life of the capital, which was
a giddy place in the latter 1850s.
Of Abraham Key's war record, the Wisconsin Biographical History says: "He enlisted Sept. 3, 1864, in the 1st
Wis. Heavy Artillery, and was in active service until the close of the war. The command nominally belong to the
Army of the Potomac, and a large part of its service was in defense of the national capital, being assigned to
the fortifications around the city of Washington. Its duties were arduous, and often called for the exercise of
as much skill and bravery as did the more active service at the front. After the war, Mr. Key returned to the old
homestead in Wyalusing township."
Children of Marshall and Sally (Scholl) Key, other than Abraham, were George (the first of the children to die),
he and his wife being buried at Patch Grove, Wisconsin; Eliza, who married Leonard Boone Elledge in Pike county
and is buried in Minnesota, where the Boone Elledges removed from Grant county, Wisconsin; Amanda, who married,
first, Frank Parrish, and second, Joe Jacco, she and her second husband being buried at Bloomington, Wisconsin;
Surilda (known as Nin), who married John Thompson, and Nancy, who married Sam Patch, they and their husbands being
buried at Patch Grove; and Mary Ann (Mate), who married Jacob Martin, both being buried at Patch Grove, as is also
the third son, Benton Key, and his wife.
Abraham Key, in 1871, married Miss Laura Herring, a native of Illinois. He died at Patch Grove in September, 1916,
at the age of 82. He was a member of the G. A. R. Post of Bloomington, Wisconsin. His widow, Laura (Herring) Key,
still lives at Patch Grove, having attained her 85th birthday on September 16, 1936. Three sons and five daughters
born to Abraham and Laura Key are all living and all but one of them, Lloyd Fitch key of Ada, Minnesota, were present
on Sunday, September 13, 1936, in Nelson Dewey State Park in Wisconsin, when Mother Key's 85th birthday was celebrated
by her family.
Nelson Dewey State Park, named for the first governor of Wisconsin, and considered one of the most picturesque
spots on the American continent, was a fitting place for the celebration in honor of Mrs. Key, who was a personal
friend of Wisconsin's first governor and who spent many happy days in the Dewey home at Cassville, where Abraham
Key, her husband, superintended the laying of the historic stone wall around the Dewey estate.
Children of Abraham Key include Mamie, wife of Philip Glass of Bagley, Wisconsin, who has supplied the writer with
much important data concerning the Wisconsin descendants of the early Griggsville pioneers; Nellie, wife of J.
J. Parsons of Madison, Wisconsin; Jennie, wife of F. H. Booth, who has a grocery store in Patch Grove, Wisconsin;
Abraham Key, Jr., of Patch Grove, who has a son, Kenneth Key, at Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin; Jesse Benton Key
of Dubuque, Iowa; Lloyd Key of Ada, Minnesota; Wisconsin Belle (Wessie Belle), wife of George Anderson of Patch
Grove; and Mrs. Millie Jane Miller, of Madison, Wisconsin. Mrs. Key has also 17 living grandchildren and 18 great
grandchildren.