Ulysses S. Grant Historical Homes, West County, St. Louis, Missouri

Ulysses S. Grant, our 18th President of the United States of America, and the victorious Civil War General, lived here in St. Louis between 1854-1860. U.S. Grant first met his bride Julia Dent at her family home known as "White Haven" in 1848 (pictured). Grant and Julia lived at White Haven home from 1854 to the summer of 1856. They received 80 acres of land, just southwest of St. Louis as a wedding present, close to the Dent family home.

Ulysses started sawing and notching the logs that would be used to build his four room, two story cabin on the property. The cabin was completed in just three days with the help of freinds.

Grant established his farm, and called it "Hardscrabble"(pictured). The Grant family out of the Dent estate, and moved into hardscrabble in 1856. Grant did most of the work on the cabin himself. He layed the floors, built the staircase and layered the shingles on the roof. The Grant family lived at Hardscrabble for a short period of time, from September to the following January 1858 when Ulysses and Julia moved back to the Dent family home following the death of Julias mother. Ulysses rented out hardscrabble while he worked in St. Louis, as a real estate business man, and as a clerk in the US Customs House.

Ulysses ran both his farm and his father in-laws farm for some time; he grew potatoes, wheat and other vegetables, gathered fruit from the orchards, too. In 1860, the Grant family moved to Illinois, and following that move Grant entered the Civil War years 1861-1865. In 1885, the home passed out of the hands of the Grant family. Sold through various hands, and finally purchased by August Busch Sr. in 1907. In intervening years, the cabin was displayed during the 1904 worlds fair. August Busch had the cabin moved and reassembled one mile from its original location. In 1977, Anheuser-Busch restored the cabin to its present condition.

Woods Fort, Troy, Missouri

The land that Troy occupies was once an old Sac and Fox campsite. The Sac and the Fox were independent tribes of the Algonquin who became allied as they were forced by the French to migrate south from the Great Lakes. A large band settled along the Missouri River and became known as the "Sac and Fox of the Missouri." European settlers began arriving in the area as early as the 1790s attracted by the Spanish land grants in the county's fertile Cuivre (French for copper) River Valley.

In 1801 Deacon Joseph Cottle erected a log cabin a short distance south of the public spring and Zadock Woods erected a double log house north of the spring. Cottle began operating a horse powered corn mill while Woods operated a tavern. In 1804 in St. Louis, Sac and Fox chiefs were persuaded to sign a treaty ceding to the U.S. Government all Sac and Fox lands east of the Mississippi River, as well as some to the west. Government efforts to enforce the land surrender raised tensions, particularly among the bands that were not party to and were unaware of the 1804 Treaty.

To defend their homes, pioneers in the area, aided by Captain Nathan (the youngest son of Daniel) Boone's Company of U.S. Mounted Rangers, built a series of forts (Woods, Howard, Stout, Clark, and Cap au Gris forts) as a first line of defense. Woods' Fort was built at the Cottle/Woods settlement and consisted of an almost square stockade made of strong oak timbers, set perpendicularly in the ground and extending to a height sufficient to afford protection from attack. Woods' Fort was the most extensive fort in the region and enclosed the spring, cabins, Woods Tavern and Inn, and Deacon Cottle's Universalist Church. Hostilities escalated when the War of 1812 began as the Sac and Fox sided with the British. During the war Woods' Fort served as headquarters for Lt. Zachary Taylor who later became the twelfth President of the United States. Hostilities ended when the Sac-Fox Treaty of 1815-1816 was signed.

The settlement that grew up around Woods' Fort became Troy when it was surveyed and laid out on September 19, 1819, by Deacon Cottle and others. The town was named by merchant Joshua N. Robbins after Troy, NY, which itself was named after the classical Troy, site of the Trojan War in Homer's "Iliad." Troy was selected in 1828 as county seat of Lincoln County, replacing Monroe and Alexandria. The town grew as a political and agricultural center using the river town of Cap Au Gris as a shipping point until the arrival of the St. Louis, Hannibal, & Keokuk Railroad in 1884. Lincoln County was sympathetic to the South during the Civil War but the almost continuous presence of Union troops in Troy kept the county free of any fighting.

At Fort Cap au Gris, Maj. (later U.S.Pres.) Zachary Taylor's command rendezvoused, Sept., 1814, and five months after the war, at Fort Howard, May 24, 1815, Black Hawk's band skirmished with settlers and Rangers in the Battle of Sink Hole. In 1824 the Sac and Fox finally gave up all claim to the region.

The Arch, and Old Courthouse, Saint Louis, Missouri

While in Saint Louis we had to visit "The Jefferson National Expansion Memorial" better known as The Gateway Arch, and the Old Courthouse. My brother, Tyler and I visited the arch, and went up to the top. What a sight of the city, and the Mississippi River. The Arch began as an idea in 1947, and built between 1963 and 1968. This memorial is to commemorate several historical events: the first government west of the Mississippi, the Louisiana Purchase, the subsequent movement west, and the debate over slavery raised by Dred Scott. Saint Louis was the starting point for Lewis and Clark's westward exploration.

Bellefontaine and Calvary Cemetery, Saint Louis, Missouri

While surfing the internet, I had an interest on what history happened in Saint Louis. Dred Scott and William T. Sherman caught my eye. What interested me about this is why do locals place Lincoln pennies on Dred Scotts head stone. Dred Scott fought for his freedom right here in Saint Louis, in the "Old Courthouse". He was finally freed nine months before he died of tuberculosis in 1858. Because of Dred Scott, Abraham Lincoln would be elected president, the south secedes from the union, and all those in bondage would be freed in 1865. William Tecumsah Sherman or "Uncle Billy" was a Union Civil War General in the western theater, known for his "March to the Sea", while burning and destroying everything in his path. General Sherman lived in Saint Louis for a short time during the secession crisis, and was the president of the St. Louis Railroad, a streetcar company.

Notable people layed to rest here at Bellefontaine: General Sterling Price of the Missouri State Guard, Union General Don Carlos Buell, Adolphus Busch of Amhueser-Busch, William Clark of Lewis and Clark, Union General General John McNeil, and Irma S.Rombauer author of The Joy of Cooking.

Other notable people layed to rest here at Calvary: Confederate General Daniel M. Frost, and Thomas Caute Reynolds, second Confederate Govenor of Missouri. Govenor Claiborne Jackson was the first. Pictured above is Union General William Techumsah Sherman and Dred Scott, both layed to rest in Calvary, also.