History, Winnebago County, Wisconsin: Its cities, towns, resources, people

              BUILDING  A   COUNTY. 187
the first Monday in April, 1843. Apparently the law makers were ignorant of the geography of the region, as they placed the first election at the school house in Manchester, Calumet county, on the opposite side of Lake Winnebago, twenty miles from the new county of Winnebago. The settlers along the Fox river at the future city of Oshkosh ignored the provisions of the law and- refused to cross the lake to hold their first election. They opened the polls in the cabin of Webster Stanley over in the woods east of Ferry street. This election was held on Monday, April 4, and Tuesday, April ,5, and we presume was upon due notice to all the inhabitants of the region. It was not authorized by law, but was very independent and democratic and doubtless very regular, as two days were given to poll all the votes. There was a total of 143 people in the region then being organized into a county. At this election, which was the first held in the county, there were twenty-three men polled and present who voted. There were twenty-one ofiices distributed, and it is said that six voters got away without any office. Mr. Chester Ford was chairman and Jason Wilkins clerk, both swofn in by T. Lee, coroner. Clark Dickinson was appointed clerk, as Wilkins refused to serve. The further result of the election: Chester Gallup and William C. Isbell, supervisors; John Gallup, town clerk; Thomas Lee and Louis B. Porlier, assessors; Webster Stanley, treasurer; Thomas Evans, collector; Eobert Grignon, Ira F. Aiken and Shipley A. Gallup, commissioners of highway; John P. Gallup and Clark Dickinson, school commissioners; Henry A. Gallup and Louis B. Porlier, constables; Jason Wilkins, sealer of weights and meas¬ ures; Ira F. Aiken, Henry Moore and Archibald Caldwell, over¬ seers of highways; Eobert Grignon, Chester Ford and Chester Gallup, fence viewers. David Johnson, William Powell, James Knaggs, Augustin Grignon, William W. Wright and William A. Boyd received some votes for these offices.
Under the laws of the Territory of Wisconsin, approved 1836, the territory of each county was declared one township for rais¬ ing taxes and to regulate highways, and the three supervisors of the town shall perform the duties of county board, and the town clerk was to act as county clerk. By the election mentioned above, which was an election of the town of Butte des Morts, under the laws of 1839 of Brown county the chairman and super¬ visors became the county board, or should have been so regarded, except for the mix-up mentioned, by which   the   election   was