Leavenworth Kansas - First City in Kansas

Leavenworth, Kansas - Page 2

Leavenworth County was established in July, 1855 and an election was scheduled to be held in October to determine the county seat. The primary contenders were Leavenworth, Kickapoo City, and Delaware City.

Like other Kansas counties, the struggle for the county seat was almost vicious and was burdened with fraudulent voters. Two steam ferries, crowded with voters from Weston, Platte City, and other Missouri towns under the pro-slavery thumb, plied between the eastern shore and Kickapoo City and Delaware City. In the end, Kickapoo City won, with Delaware City coming in second, and Leavenworth third. However, Delaware City claimed that some of her citizens had been barred from the privilege of voting and her polls were thrown open a second day, this time resulting in a win for Delaware City. Afterwards, a legal contest ensued between the three towns but, Delaware City was declared the county seat in January, 1856.

The early commercial development of Leavenworth was rapid, as it became the starting point of the overland transportation company owned and operated by Majors, Russell & Company in the Fall of 1855. Eventually employing more than 500 wagons, 7,500 head of cattle, and nearly 1,800 men, it was a boon for Leavenworth.

Like numerous other Kansas counties, the county seat contest was

vicious. Fraud was rampant as pro-slavery men from Missouri flooded

the polls. In the end, the county seat would go to Leavenworth. The

two other towns that vied for the seat were Delaware City, which had

ceased to exist within just a few years, and Kickapoo City, which is no

longer a town, but a few buildings still remain.

Their arrival brought in numerous new stores and a businesses that otherwise, would not have come for years. Salt Lake and California traders soon made their starting point Leavenworth, rather than points in Missouri. Leavenworth was also made the starting-point for the Kansas Stage Company. A small building near the levee was rented by a Lutheran minister for religious purposes. The first school in the community was taught by H. D. McCarty. By October, 1855, just one year from the first sale of lots, there were about 1,200 people living in Leavenworth City.

The great number of employees of these freight companies and the transient population demanded more hotel accommodations. This led to the erection of the Planters' Hotel, completed in the fall of 1856, which became one of the most famous hotels on the Missouri River. However, for a brief period during 1856, Leavenworth City, like many other Kansas towns of the time, found itself embroiled in the vicious Kansas-Missouri Border War, which hindered its growth for a time.

Into this tumultuous time in Leavenworth, arrived a brave young African-American man named William Dominick Matthews. A black freeman from Maryland, Matthews established the Waverly House, a boarding establishment that was located on Main Street between Shawnee and Seneca Streets. His boarding house would soon become a “station” on the Underground Railroad. This was a very brave undertaking, as Matthews arrived at the very worst time of Leavenworth's border troubles. In spite of the turmoil, or, perhaps because of it, he was extremely active in harboring slave fugitives from Missouri and Arkansas, with the assistance of area abolitionists, including Daniel R. Anthony, a local newspaper editor and brother of Susan B. Anthony. Matthews would go on to serve as one of the few colored captains in the Civil War.

In the meantime, a 30’x20’ two room county building was completed in Delaware City in February, 1857 and plans were made to build a new jail. However, the Kansas Legislature ordered that another county seat vote be conducted in October, 1857. This time, the election resulted in a win for Kickapoo City. However, Leavenworth City petitioned that the Kickapoo City returns be thrown out, on the grounds that voting was not confined to the county. In the meantime, Joseph W. Hall, a commissioner from Kickapoo City and leader of the county seat war, had died during the preceding June, or it may have been that Leavenworth City would again have been slighted. This time, Leavenworth's claims were no longer overlooked, and it was finally decided that Leavenworth had received the majority of the legal votes and was entitled to the county seat. Leavenworth remains the county seat today.

Though land was donated for a courthouse square and bonds were voted in to build one, it would be years before a courthouse would be built. Instead, the courts and county offices were located for many years in the City Hall, over the Market House, and in a building that was later occupied by the Fire Department.

The Planters Hotel was completed in December, 1856, stood at the corner

of Main and Shawnee Streets. It consisted of 100 rooms that provided comfortable and spacious accommodations and was a gathering place

for pro-slavery forces prior to the Civil War It was utilized for almost a

century before it was declared unsafe for occupancy in the 1950s and eventually torn down.

By the Fall of 1857, the town had grown to some 5,000 people and would double over the next year. In July, 1858, the first school board of the city was organized, a house rented to use for the school and a teacher was hired. That same month, however, a blow was dealt to Leavenworth in the form of a disastrous fire. Starting in the theater on the corner of Third and Delaware Streets, it swept away a large part of the business district, and for a time it looked as though the whole city would be wiped out. However, due to the heroic efforts of the citizens and a lucky rainstorm, the fire was finally quelled, but, not before over $200,000 worth of property was destroyed.

The year 1858 also brought thousands of westward bound emigrants through the city when gold was discovered in Colorado. More importantly, the year also saw the arrival of the Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth to the city.

Before making their way to Leavenworth, the Sisters, who had lived in Nashville, Tennessee, found themselves burdened with a debt not of their making. After selling nearly everything they had to pay their creditors, they established a new base of operations in Leavenworth that would eventually grow into a hospital and a college that still exist today. Within a week of their arrival, they were teaching in a boys’ school. In November, they opened a day and boarding school for girls on the north side of Kickapoo Street. The next year, the girl's school was moved to downtown Leavenworth and called St. Mary's Institute. They also tended to the sick, going into homes and wagon trains and traveling to towns during epidemics. They educated black children who had fled to the free state of Kansas, took in orphans, visited prisoners and cared for the poor.

In 1859 Leavenworth received telegraph lines to communicate with the East, its streets were graded, sidewalks laid, and gas works constructed. That same year, on December 3, 1859, the day after Kansas abolitionist John Brown was hanged, Abraham Lincoln made a speech in Leavenworth. Speaking on the steps of the Planters Hotel, he urged voters not to use violence but, to use their vote at the ballot box to keep slavery from expanding into the territory. His speech is said to be similar to what is considered to be his first presidential campaign speech, delivered months later at Coopers Union in New York. From that day forward the Planters Hotel became a Leavenworth landmark and continued to serve the traveling public for decades. However, by the 1950's, it was declared unsafe for occupancy and eventually torn down.

With the growth of the city it soon became a cross-roads point. There were two great military roads from Fort Leavenworth, one which joined the emigrant road at Whitfield City, and a second known as the Oregon and California Road. Roads were laid out to connect Leavenworth with towns up and down the Missouri River, and to Lawrence, Lecompton and Topeka; hack and mail lines were established, making weekly and tri-weekly trips to towns of importance in the territory; the telegraph line was extended from St. Louis, Missouri to Leavenworth in June, 1859, and the following spring the Pike's Peak Express Line began running from Leavenworth to Salt Lake, Utah. The first railroad to come near Leavenworth was the Atchison & St. Joseph, which was completed to Weston, Missouri in 1861, where it made connection with river transportation to Leavenworth. Two years later Leavenworth became a terminus of the Kansas Pacific Railroad, connecting with the main line at Lawrence. Over the years, numerous other railroads would pass through the city, including the Union Pacific; Missouri Pacific; Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe; Chicago & Rock Island; Chicago, Burlington & Quincy; Leavenworth, Kansas & Western, and the Kansas City-Leavenworth electric line which connected the two cities.

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