|
MRS. JANE MARTIN
JOHNS saw Decatur grown for seventy years, and in whatever
work came to the hands of the women in that period she was one
of the leaders. She first came to Decatur in 1849, and in
1854 returned to make it her home. Here she lived until
her death in 1919.
MRS. JANE M. JOHNS
Mrs. Johns was a woman of unusual intelligence, and her
volume of "Personal Recollections" valued of Civil war times in
Decatur is one of the most valued of local historical books.
Little escaped her keen observation, and her own activity in
women's work during the war together with her knowledge of the
horrors of the war gained through army, gave her an insight of
the war such as few women had.
In her later years her wonderful memory served her well in
recounting those days. It was considered a remarkable feat
that at the age of eighty-five she was able to tell so
realistically of events of the stirring days of the war
fifty-five years before.
Miss Jane Martin and Dr. H. C. Johns were married in
Circleville, O., Oct. 29, 1845, and came to Illinois in 1849,
settling first in Piatt county.1
In 1854 they moved to Decatur.
Dr. Johns had practiced medicine in Ohio, but gave up
that profession on coming to Macon county, in order to devote
his time to farming and stock raising. He was extremely
successful, and became recognized as an authority on stock.
In 1852 he helped organize the Illinois State Board of
Agriculture, and served as vice president and as president of
that body. In 1856 he made a trip to England to represent
the Illinois State Breeders association, returning with the
first shorthorn cattle, Irish terriers and Berkshire pigs ever
brought here.
The Johns home on Johns hill, now the site of the Washington
grade school and the Johns hill Junior high school, was for many
years one of Decatur's interesting homes.
When that house was built, in the '50s, it was a country
home. Decatur did not then extend that far. Located
on the top of the hill, which is one of the highest elevations
in Decatur, the house commanded a view which could not be had
elsewhere.
The house stood in the northwest forty of a tract of 160
acres. The land was bought by William Martin,
father of Mrs. Johns, in 1852. Soon afterward he
began the erection of the house, completing it in 1857.2 This property was to
be Mrs. John's chief inheritance from her father.
When Mrs. Johns had her first sight of that hill, she
said she would be content to live at Decatur only if she could
live on that hill. She had her wish, and all the years of
her life afterwards it was her home.
Her gift to Decatur of about eighteen acres of the home farm
is described in the chapter on parks. She often said:
"This land has been the playground for Decatur children for
sixty years. I want it saved for them."
She also hoped that the summit of the hill, the site of the
home, could be used as the site for some sort of monumental
structure. She did not think of two great school buildings
like the Washington grade school and the Johns hill Junior high,
but they admirably carry out the plan she had vaguely in her
mind.
The school ground and park together include about thirty-one
acres. It is a combination that educators say is hardly
equalled in the country.
Mrs. Johns was one of the founders of Ladies' Library
association, the forerunner of the Decatur public library, and
raised money for books and otherwise helped to keep that society
going during its first early years of struggle. She also
was one of the charter members of the Decatur Woman's club.
THE JOHNS HOME
SHARON WICK'S NOTE:
My
grandmother, Madge Love Montgomery, penciled in
the following words below the picture of the Johns Home:
"Mother (Sarah E. Grindle Love) lived near here on
E. Williams St. They kept their cow this side of the fence
shown in picture. Had house & 2 lots."
Mrs. Johns' life was filled with interesting
experiences. She was a personal friend of Abraham
Lincoln, Judge David Davis and other notable men of
her time. Once in 1843, when only sixteen, while on a boat
trip to New Orleans she had the pleasure of meeting Henry
Clay.
She also happened to be in New Orleans on Jan. 21, 1861, the
day Louisiana seceded from the union, and in telling of that
time said it was almost impossible to describe the tense feeling
and excitement that prevailed in the south then.
Mrs. Johns first met Abraham Lincoln in 1849,
on the day he helped to unload her piano at the Macon house in
Decatur, where she was living temporarily. That evening
she gave a piano program for Lincoln and the other
lawyers who were here, it being court week in Decatur.
More than once in after years Mrs. Johns entertained
Lincoln in her home, both while she lived in Piatt county
and when a resident of Decatur.
That piano, as has often been told, was the first in Decatur,
and it attracted no little attention. It was quite a
curiosity, and people from a distance when in Decatur always
went to take a look at the instrument. Often Mrs. Johns
played and sang for Mr. Lincoln.
In her book Mrs. Johns tells the story of overhearing
a plot to defeat Lincoln when he was a candidate for the United
States senate in 1855, and of how Lincoln, on hearing of the
plot, sacrificed his own interests and brought about the
election of Lyman Trumbull. Mrs. Johns was
in Springfield at the time, her husband being a member of the
general assembly. She was in her hotel room when she heard
the plot being discussed by men in the room next to her.
Mrs. Johns saw her country engaged in four wars, the
Mexican, Civil, Spanish-American and Ward wars. She was
one of the most active workers in the Hospital Aid society of
Decatur during the Civil war. She was then a young woman.
When the World war came on she was again ready, though then
ninety-one-years of age, to do her bit. Day after day she
met with the other women at the Red Cross headquarters, as busy
almost as she had been during the troublous days of the '60s.
Making trench candles was her part of the activities this time.
Mrs. Johns once made a visit to the American Samoa
Islands, when her son-in-law, Rear Admiral C. B. T. Moore,
was governor of the islands. She was then seventy-eight years
old, but she enjoyed that trip as much as a woman of younger
years. It was a characteristic of her - to remain young in
spite of her advancing years. It might be said that she
never grew old, though at the time she passed away, June 26,
1919, she was nearly ninety-two years of age. She had been
a widow since 1900, her husband having passed away in that year.
------------------
1 Mrs.
Johns tells in her book
how Dr. Johns
happened to locate in Illinois.
He had first chosen
Lafayette, Ind., as his home, but he changed his mind after a
visit to Illinois. With a friend he had come to Piatt
county to hunt deer. When near Decatur their fine blooded
horses frightened at a peddler's wagon and ran away. Dr.
Johns was
through out of the buggy and his collarboan was broken.
Dr. Joseph King was summoned, and took the injured man
to the home of his friend. Dr. Peter
Hull, near Monticello.
While at
Monticello, he was so pleased with the land thereabouts that he
purchased 1600 acres near that city. It later became the
Robert Allerton
farm. Dr. Johns then
went back to Ohio to persuade his wife to come to Illinois.
They made the trip by water to Lafayette and then by wagon here.
2 The
first spiral stairway in Macon county was put in the
Johns home. It was built by Andrew
Martin and
was hewed out of wood by hand.
<PREVIOUS> <NEXT>
<CLICK HERE
TO RETURN TO TABLE OF CONTENTS>
|
