Early History of Two Pioneers

John R, Jackson 1847-1872
Michael T. Simmons 1865-1868

Colonel Simmons Operated a Farm and Gristmill on Drew's Prairie

Chehalis Bee-Nugget
April 22, 1922
By J. C. Bush

The first part of this article written by J. C. Bush tells the story of Edward Huggins, of the Hudson's Bay Company as he traveled to the Cowlitz Farms and back to Fort Nisqually in 1850. The second part of the article is a recollection of Jackson and Simmons by J. C. Bush and Charlotte Koontz, daughter of Michael Simmons.

Edward Huggins trip to Cowlitz Farms

An except from the Nisqually Journal of occurrences; On Friday morning September 6, 1850, Edward Huggins began a trip to the Cowlitz Farms and he was to return with employees Jollibois and Lapoitrie along with 50 bushels of wheat from Marciel Bernier's farm at Newaukum. Huggins arrived back at Fort Nisqually on Wednesday, September 11, 1850 in the evening, ahead of Jollibois and Lapoitrie bringing the mail with him. 

The following is his account of the trip back to the fort written by Huggins in September of 1900;

The road from Centralia prairie as I may as well call it, went through a piece of low, swampy bottom which was notoriously known as Saunders' bottom, from the fact of a settler, an American named Saunders, having taken up a claim on the prairie at the farther end of the bottom, at the base of a wooded hill, then called Mud mountain. The city of Chehalis now stands upon the site of Saunders' farm. The road through this bottom in the winter time was a terrible road to travel.

It was almost impassible, being in many places a little better than a lake, its soil being of a sticky stiff, muddy character. Why, even when I went through it, in the month of September of 1850, in places it was almost impassible. One time I was wading through the bottom, myself and horse covered in mud, when I came upon old John Sutherland, a man well known to many old and new settlers in Pierce county, with an overturned wagon and four horses in the middle of one of the worst mud holes. 

Legs and shoulders and sides of bacon were scattered all about, and poor John was in a deplorable condition. He was hauling a load of bacon belonging to John R. Jackson, a well known farmer, living near the Cowlitz prairie. John took it all very philosophically and declined any offer of assistance, saying that another team would be along shortly, from which he would get assistance. I never heard how he got out of the hole or weather he succeeded in saving his bacon. 

Two or three years after my trip across the bottom the worst of the mud holes were corduroyed, which at high stages of water would be floated out of place and the road would then be worse than ever. I proceeded, and in a short time got into a fine, rather large prairie, upon which was a good deal of the usual zig-zag fencing and two or three houses. The first place was the home of an old Canadian, and at the far end of the prairie was the well known farm of john R. Jackson, who owns a full section of what looked to be the finest kind of land. 

It was fairly well improved. On it were several log houses. The dwelling was large and the main room was very much like an English farm kitchen. Jackson was an Englishman and had been a farmer in Yorkshire. He was never in the service of the Hudson's Bay Company, but was a genuine emigrant, arriving at the site of his home in 1848. Jackson's was the best known place in the country, and was the stopping place for almost all people traveling between Portland and Puget Sound. 

Jackson had provided ample accommodations for the exigencies of those times. When this country was part of Oregon Territory and Thurston was the only county on the Sound, district court was held at Jackson's and that gentleman built a palatial building of large peeled logs which was used as the courthouse. In 1850, Judge William Strong, at that time the most prominent lawyer in Oregon, was the judge in charge of the court. 

In those early days persons of foreign birth desirous of taking advantage of the donation land act were obliged to go to Jackson's to declare their intension to become American citizens, and to my personal knowledge, many a chap who couldn't tell you who Washington was, the name of the president of the United States, nor even the name of the Territory in which he was residing, was admitted to citizenship and then took up all the way from 360 to 640 acres of land anywhere in the territory that was unoccupied and not on any lands claimed by the two British companies, which remained unsurveyed by the United States until 1870.

Returning again to my theme, Jackson was a big lusty man, and, as usual with Yorkshire men, sharp and smart at a trade. He was a good farmer and owned a lot of fine horses and cattle, and I have paid him large prices for what was then called American horses. I paid him once, in the early sixties, for a team of three-year olds, costing me $400. He was a married man and the father of a family. 

Matilda Jackson was an American; then per necessity, a hard working, motherly kind of woman, as were most of the American women, farmer's wives, I met in those days. I have no doubt that the old fellows now alive that traveled that road, nearly fifty years ago, still recollect the savory, well cooked meals the kind hearted Mrs. Jackson would prepare for them.
Jackson, as may be supposed, was doing justice to a toothsome meal of Yorkshire bacon and eggs, cooked in inimitable style. 

Having had but little to eat since I left Linklater's, I was almost famished when I arrived at Jackson's. I had a long chat with the worthy farmer, and afterwards walked over his place and was really surprised at the extent of his improvements. He showed me, we a great deal of pride, the new courthouse and pointed out to me its architectural beauties, which, I admit, I failed to see, having so recently come from a land wherein fine buildings were common. I took care not to let the old gentleman know this and towards the evening bade the worthy couple a kindly good bye.

The Simmons' in Lewis County

It is not generally known at this day that the Simmons family lived in Lewis county as well as in Thurston and Mason counties. Colonel Simmons was connected with the grist mill at Tumwater from 1845 to 1854. In the latter year he moved to Skookum bay, four miles from Shelton, where he lived until 1865 when he moved to Drew's prairie in Lewis county. He died in 1868 and was buried at Tumwater, where a monument has since been erected to his memory by the public-spirited citizens of Washington. 

Colonel Simmons was an Indian Agent under Governor Stevens. He helped organize the Masonic lodge at Olympia and was in the truest sense a leading and active citizen of Washington for more than twenty years in the earliest history of the territory. There are at this time in 1922, eight of Colonel Simmons' sons and daughters living, three of them in Lewis county. The eight include Charlotte Koontz, Chehalis (to whom I am indebted for the information about the Simmons family); Mrs. John Bannon, Vader; Charles Simmons, Vader; George W. Simmons, San Francisco; E. M. Simmons, Puyallup, C. C. Simmons, Mud Bay, Michael T. Simmons, Ellensburg. 

On coming to Drew's prairie the Simmons family moved into their new two-room house, built by Frenchman John Broulet, from whom Simmons bought the half section of land. Although the place was almost entirely prairie land, only a small part had been fenced or cultivated before Simmons came.

Simmons bought all of the machinery of Captain Drew's mill, located at the ford of Drew's creek. The mill had not been operated since Captain Drew left the country, which was some time before the coming of Simmons. Simmons built his grist mill on the same creek in a shallow canyon just back of his house. The water for power was conducted by means of a flume from the upper creek. He and his sons sold to "Bill" Jackson of Arkansas creek.

A. J. Simmons was a brother of Michael T. Simmons. He came to Washington Territory at a later date than M. T. Simmons. For a while he had a sawmill at South Bay, near Steilacoom. He sold his sawmill and moved to the Cowlitz prairie in 1868. He became sheriff of Lewis county but died in 1870. In 1865 when Colonel Simmons moved to Lewis county he stopped at the Jackson place on Highland prairie, for a drink of water. While they were there, Simmons' daughter Charlotte, then 15 years old, met John Koontz, Jackson's stepson, at that time. 

John and Charlotte Koontz first lived on Drew's prairie, a year; then at Cowlitz Landing two years; on Grand prairie two years, then moved to Jackson prairie where they resided continuously until the time of John's death in 1901. Speaking of the early life, Charlotte recently said that when she and her husband first started out in their married life, all their worldly possessions could easily have been loaded into an ordinary wagon with plenty of room to spare. 

One article of her wedding dowry was a Grover & Baker sewing machine, a real luxury in those days, but a very poor make of a sewing machine. The machine was traded for a horse, a thing more necessary in times when plain calico dresses were the rule for Sunday as well as week days and styles seldom changed. Joe Grover, a bachelor, had a half section of land on the east side of Jackson prairie, later known as the Lucas land. He was a nephew of Matilda Jackson. John R. Jackson had a 640 acre claim and he also owned the St. Germain claim on the north end of the prairie, practically all of the prairie land.

Charlotte Koontz says the original courthouse was higher than the rebuilt structure and had bedrooms upstairs. The frame house, a hundred yards south of the courthouse, now occupied by Daniel Mowrie, was built by Barton Koontz, where he lived with his mother, Matilda Jackson until the time or her death at the age of 90 years, February 14, 1901. Barton Koontz died on May 19, 1917.