Memoirs of Waukesha County. From the earliest historical times to the present with chapters on various subjects, including each of the different towns, and a genealogical and biographical record of representative families in the county, prepared from data obtained from original sources of information.

              MEMOIRS  OF  WAUKESHA  COUNTY 107
in the breed of us Americans. We are so constituted that we are willing to respect and obey the laws as long as the laws work to the general welfare, but when we perceive that they do not, or think we perceive it, then we are sometimes apt to cast our respect and obedi¬ ence aside and try to make private arrangements to satisfy existing necessities. In Texas and in some other states they used to hang a man for stealing a horse, and even here in Waukesha county I once saw a man hanged for an offense against morals rather than against law, though he escaped death, luckily, and was afterwards a highly respected citizen and father of a fine family, so I won't mention his name.
"It all came of the Rock River canal fight, which lasted from 1837 on for about ten years. Byron Kilbourn had the idea that a canal from Milwaukee to Lake Koshkonong, running along the Menomonee river into Waukesha county ^ and across its northern townships to Nagawicka lake; then taking in Nemahbin lake and down Bark river to Lake Koshkonong, would be of immense commercial importance to the port of Milwaukee; and he procured legislation in favor of it at home, and afterwards in congress, where alternate sections of land were donated to the state for canal purposes along the proposed line of the canal for a width of ten miles.
"These canal lands were to be sold for $2.50 per acre, instead of the regular $1.25 charged for government acres, the proximity to the canal being considered a sufficient reason for paying the additional price. But somehow the canal did not materialize. It was found that there were enemies of the project just as active and energetic as its friends, and every effort of the latter to get the enterprise going was met by as strong an effort to prevent its success. In the meantime set¬ tlers from the east were streaming in, most of whom did not like to pay the $2.50 rate for land which was likely to be forfeited by the state after a few years on account of non-completion of the canal, when it would be sold at the ordinary $1.25 figure. So the newcomers squatted on the canal lands and went on with their improvements, intending to pay for the property when it should revert to the general government, as it was expected to do.
"By 1844 a mile or so of the canal had b^en built within the present city limits of Milwaukee and a dam erected across the Milwaukee river as a feeder for it. This dam and canal were afterwards the foundation of the city's prosperity, since they brought into usable shape the fine water power that the river then afforded. As there ap¬ peared to be a prospect of the ultimate completion of the canal there were covetous glances directed towards the improved lands of the squatters on the canal sections, but it was pretty w^ll understood that anybody who should undertake to buy such lands from the state would do so at his peril.
"In the year 1846 two brothers named Nelson were running a saw¬ mill which they had built on their canal land claim in the northwest section of the town of Menomonee. A few miles north of them lived an Irishman whom I will call O'Pake, with a family including three strapping boys.   He thought the Nelson claim worth much more than