The following article was excerpted from William Dollarhide’s new book, Illinois Name Lists, 1678-2009:
For genealogical research in Illinois, the following timeline of events should help any genealogist understand the area with an historical and genealogical point of view:
1673. French explorers Jacques Marquette and Louis Jolliet discovered the Illinois River and upper portions of the Mississippi River. They then descended the Mississippi to the mouth of the Arkansas River and returned to present-day Illinois via the Illinois River.
1675. Jacques Marquette founded a mission at the Great Village of the Illinois River, near present-day Utica, Illinois.
1680. French explorer René-Robert Cavelier (Sieur de LaSalle) and trader Henri deTonti built Fort Crève Coeur on the Illinois River, near present-day Peoria.
1682. René-Robert Cavelier (Sieur de LaSalle) erected a cross near the confluence of the Mississippi River and the Gulf of Mexico, after floating down river from the Illinois Country. He claimed the entire Mississippi Basin for Louis XIV of France, for whom Louisiana was named. All of the rivers and streams flowing into the Mississippi were part of the Mississippi Basin and included in the Louisiana claim.
1696. Jesuit priest Pierre François Pinet established a mission near the site of present-day Chicago. The
Mission l’Ange Gardie (Mission of the Guardian Angel) was abandoned in 1700.
1699 Cahokia. Québec priests founded the Holy Family Mission at Cahokia, named for the Indians there, near present-day East St. Louis on the Mississippi River. Cahokia was the first permanent settlement in the Illinois Country.
1703 Kaskaskia. The French established a mission and settlement at Kaskaskia, named for the river and Indians there, near the Mississippi River. Kaskaskia became the capital of Upper Louisiana after Fort de Charles was built in 1718.
1717-1762 French Louisiana. In 1717, the Illinois Country was officially added to the French Louisiana jurisdiction within New France. At that time la Louisiane Française extended from Vincennes, on the Wabash River, down the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers to include several ports on the Gulf of Mexico. Any trading posts or forts north of Vincennes were considered part of French Québec. By 1721, several hundred French colonists had abandoned Arkansas Post, the capital of Lower Louisiana, and the largest settlement of all of French Louisiana since 1686. A few French trading forts between the Great Lakes and New Orleans remained and continued to be the focal point for trade with the Indians in the region. As a failed farming community, Arkansas Post was typical of the French efforts to colonize North America south of the Great Lakes. They were much more interested in trading for furs with the Indians. From 1721 to 1762, no new farming communities were ever established. Arkansas Post continued as a trading fort, and the French presence in the Mississippi Basin consisted mainly of single French trappers and traders paddling their canoes from one trading post to the next. The French established military forts at strategic locations, partly as a means of protecting the trappers during their contacts with the Indians. In comparison, the British colonies by 1762 had over 2,500 miles of improved wagon roads, between Boston and Charles Town. The British colonies had an economy based on town tradesmen surrounded by small farms, with the exchange of goods and produce up and down the Atlantic coast. During this same period, the French had built one road that was 12 miles long, and that was only to provide portage between rivers. Unlike the French Québec settlements, French Louisiana had very few farming communities, and there was little exchanging of goods or produce, except for the trapping and trading of furs.
1763. The Seven Years War, which was called the French and Indian War in colonial America, ended with the 1763 Treaty of Paris. France lost virtually all of its North American claims – the western side of the Mississippi was lost to Spain, and the eastern side of the Mississippi was lost to Britain. The British also gained Quebec from the French. In a separate treaty in 1763, the British acquired Florida from the Spanish in exchange for Cuba. See the 1763 map in the US map section (of the Illinois Name Lists book).
1774 Québec Act. After deciding not to repeat the evacuation of all French Acadians from Nova Scotia in the mid 1760s, the British Parliament passed the Québec Act, permitting the French Canadians to retain French laws and customs, and allowed the Catholic Church to maintain its position there. The early French settlements in present-day Michigan, Indiana, Illinois and Wisconsin, were by the act included in the Province of Québec, but remained under British rule.
1778-1779. During the Revolutionary War, General George Rogers Clark of the Virginia Militia led the American forces to celebrated victories over the British, with the capture of Kaskaskia in 1778 and Vincennes in 1779. Because the British ceded the entire Northwest Territory to the U.S. in the 1783 treaty of Paris, Clark was often hailed as the “Conqueror of the Old Northwest.”
1781 Prairie du Chien. The first American settlement on the Mississippi River was at Prairie du Chien near the present border of Wisconsin and Illinois. The purpose of the settlement was mostly to exploit the lead deposits discovered nearby.
1783. Post-Revolutionary War. The 1783 Treaty of Paris recognized the United States of America as an independent nation and defined its borders from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi River. Although the settlements in the Great Lakes/Northwest Territory region (formerly part of the British Province of Québec) were to be included within the United States, British military forces continued to maintain control of much of the Great Lakes area for several years after the Revolution.
1787 Northwest Territory. The Ordinance of 1787 established the Territory Northwest of the River Ohio,
and defined the procedure for any territory to obtain statehood. States carved out of the original area of the Northwest Territory included Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, and that part of Minnesota east of the Mississippi River.
1787-1815 Flatboat Era. The main family transportation on the Ohio River (usually beginning at Brownsville, Pittsburgh, or Wheeling) was by a flatboat designed for a one-way trip. The large, steerable rafts were constructed of lumber and nails that could be disassembled by migrating families when they arrived at their new homesites along the Ohio River and tributaries. The flatboat era continued until the classic flat-bottomed steamboats were introduced on the Ohio River in 1815
1796. The British evacuated Detroit and abandoned their other posts on the Great Lakes, the last of the British hold-outs in the Old Northwest.
1800. Indiana Territory was established from the Northwest Territory with William Henry Harrison as the first Governor and Vincennes the capital. The area included all of present-day Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, and the western half of Michigan. The Northwest Territory was reduced to the present-day area of Ohio and the eastern half of Michigan.
1800-1802 Louisiana. Napoleon defeated the Spanish in battle and gained title to Louisiana again after trading them a couple of duchies in Italy. However, Napoleon found that his troops in the Caribbean were under siege and unable to provide much help in establishing a French government in Louisiana. Several months later, when American emissaries showed up trying to buy New Orleans from him, Napoleon decided to unload the entire tract.
1803 Louisiana. Surprised and delighted that Napoleon was willing to sell the entire tract called Louisiana, President Thomas Jefferson urged Congress to vote in favor, and the U.S. purchased the huge tract from France, doubling the size of the United States. The purchase of Louisiana immediately created a dispute about ownership of lands east of the Mississippi River, since the legal description of the Louisiana Purchase was the “drainage of the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers.” The Spanish did not agree that it included lands east of the Mississippi and maintained their claim to West Florida.
1804-1805 Louisiana District and Orleans Territory. In 1804, Congress divided the Louisiana Purchase into two jurisdictions: Louisiana District and Orleans Territory. The latter had north and south bounds the same as the present state of Louisiana, but did not include land east of the Mississippi River, and its northwestern corner extended on an indefinite line west into Spanish Texas. For a year, Louisiana District was attached to Indiana Territory for judicial administration, but became Louisiana Territory with its own Governor in 1805.
1809. Illinois Territory was created from Indiana Territory, with Kaskaskia as the territorial capital. The original area included present-day Illinois and Wisconsin; as well as a portion of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, and Minnesota east of the Mississippi.
1812-1815 Steamboats. First introduced in 1812, by 1815 steamboats had quickly become the main mode of transportation on the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers.
1818 December. Illinois became the 21st state, with the same boundaries as today. The territorial capital of Kaskaskia continued as the first state capital, but the capital was moved to Vandalia in 1820
1837. Chicago was incorporated as a city.
1839. The state capital of Illinois was moved from Vandalia to Springfield.
1846. About 20,000 Mormons left Nauvoo, Illinois for the Great Salt Lake Basin in Utah.
1846. The Donner party left Springfield, Illinois by wagon train for California; forty-two persons perished in the Sierra Mountains due to heavy snowstorms.
1945. The Chicago Cubs won the National League pennant, but lost the World Series to the Detroit Tigers.
For Further Reading:
Illinois Name Lists, 1678-2009.