The Converse Mounds and the West Side Court House

The Converse Mounds

In the section on Archaelogy in his History of the City of Grand Rapids, Albert Baxter wrote:

"The burial grounds of the Indians at the village below the Pearl street bridge, west side, comprised also a number of mounds, which since have been defaced and leveled in the construction of streets. And there, as elsewhere, in some of them it was found that beneath the buried remains of Indians of the tribes found here by the whites, were other and earlier deposits of similar character, in which were relics of the origin of which these later tribes professed to have no knowledge. The grading and working of streets on the west side of these rapids, displaced most of that portion of the mounds above the general level, and therein were found a variety of beads, rings, bracelets, and silver trinkets, along with the skeletons exhumed. Usually the bones were reburied, and the other articles appropriated by the discoverers."

And, later:

"A number of them were on the west side of the river within the city limits. In grading these were only cut down to about the general level, and in this process many bones and implements of comparatively recent deposit were found. But it was in deeper excavating, for sewerage and for laying gas and water pipes, that older and more interesting articles were discovered-often in deposits directly under those of the burial places of the Indian tribes that were here when the white people came. Four mounds silver (about thirteen pounds), and one of copper (about fourteen pounds), with bone husking pegs, copper axes, bear's teeth  with holes drilled in them, and other curiosities, which Mr. Coffinberry sold to the Curator of the Peabody Museum in Salem, Mass., for $200. An offer of $100 was made by the Smithsonian Institution for the Norton mound relics; but these, under previous stipulation, belonged to the Kent Scientific Institute. With all these deposits were found human bones that had the appearance of having been divested of flesh before they were placed in the pits or cists; generally the long bones with the relics and the craniums on top, upright in position and very near together. Louis Campau, the pioneer fur trader here, said that the natives had no knowledge of the origin of these mounds; only knew them to be the work of human hands; had great veneration for them, and a propensity for being buried on or near them. They were mute evidences of earlier occupation, probably by a different race of people."

And:

 "In 1882, in leveling a mound near the west end of Pearl street bridge, skeletons were exhumed; and there Mr. Coffinberry found a copper spear point or needle, six or seven inches long, one-fourth of an inch in diameter in the middle, tapering to a smooth rounded point at one end and to a sort of flattened shank at the other. Silver beads also were dug up. He thought these antedated the Ottawa and Chippewa occupation here, or that of any tribe -of the-past two or three centuries. A writer in a Detroit paper, describing similar needles found in Canada, suggested that they were Indian sewing needles, used in the construction of bark canoes, garments, and other things, and called attention to a similarity in shape between them and the sewing machine needle of the present day."

I will attempt to interpret this map drawn in 1836-7 by Noah Brookfield.  The first horizontal line is Bridge Street, below that currently Allen Steet/Sibley Street, then current Lake Michigan Drive.  The ferry shown started at Ferry Street on the east side and terminated in an indian trail that turned into Stocking Street.  There is a railroad bridge there, now.  The next horizontal down is West Fulton, then Wealthy Avenue.  The vertical streets are, from the river, current Front Street, then West Division now Seward Street, then Straight Street,  for a long time the western boundary of Grand Rapids.

The Court House on the West Side

This map, courtesy of Barbara Vandermark, was drawn by Henry Hart in 1853.  Notice that the streets have different names than they are now known by.  I was intrigued by the drawing of the court house and jail on the south side of Bridge Street, and Court Street, which was later changed to Tremont, and then to Douglas.  I had to search quite a while to find out about that building, but finally found a reference in Baxter's History of  the City of Grand Rapids:

"KENT COUNTY JAIL. The first Kent County Jail was in one corner of the Court House on the Public Square, that was built in 1838. Under an act of the Legislature, March 28, 1838, it was provided that prisoners apprehended in Ionia and Ottawa counties should be placed in the Kent county jail. After that building burned in 1844, until 1854, the county was dependent upon rented quarters for a jail. For some years the cellar under a building which stood on the east side of Canal street, between Lyon and Pearl, was used for jail purposes. During the ten years after the original jail was burned, the county was to considerable expense for the keeping of its prisoners in Barry and Ottawa counties. In May, 1847, the Supervisors advertised for proposals to build a county jail, but nothing came of it. In March, 1851, proposals were invited for a site for a jail, and also for the building of one, and in May of the same year the County Clerk invited proposals for the building of a jail and Sheriff's residence. This resulted in the procurement of a site a few rods south of Bridge street, west of Front street, and the building thereon of a two-story frame residence for the Sheriff, with a jail at the rear, of heavy oak plank, sheathed on the inside with sheet iron. This was not a remarkably secure place of confinement, and there were several escapes therefrom. It was occupied and used, however, from the beginning of 1855 until March, 1872."

In an interesting turn of events, Harriet street, in the map above was actually named Court Street for a while, and then changed to Scribner.