Wisconsin Historical Collections, Volume VI (1872)

              reminiscences of the first house and first resident family of madison the two following papers relating to some incidents in the early history of madison the first written by w h canfield esq and the other by mrs roseline peck originally appeared in the baraboo republic of march 8th and april 19 1880 mrs peck having recently made some additions to her narrative they require some explanation in the report on the pic ture gallery of the society contained in the fourth volume of the society's collections it became necessary to give some historic notice of the first house in madison an oil painting of which had been preserved at the in stance of gen simeon mills and by him generously presented to the so ciety and as featherstonhattgh's work was not generally known and he had given a piquant narrative of his visit to madison in 1837 when the place contained but the one house an extract from his early work giving the then impressions of the writer was deemed preferable to the faded rec ollections of some old pioneer of events that had transpired twenty-two years before it was not then known to the editor who furnished the extract to the picture gallery report that mr featherstonhaugh had exaggerated these facts or done violence to truth or proper caution would have been ex ercised but at most his statements even had they been substantially true so far as they relate to mrs peck and her house are harmless — containing no tinge of reproach upon her worth or character we cannot but tbink in the judgment of charity that mrs peck has unintentionally magnified mr featherstonhaugh's " squibs as she terms them into an unmerited at tack upon her fair name and character the wonder is under all the un toward circumstances not that the worthy pioneer family of madison had so few comforts and accommodations but that they had so many and dis pensed them to weary travelers like mr featherstonhaugh with so lib eral and cheerful a hand mrs peck and family are still pleasantly re membered by all the early residents of madison mr featherstonatjgh who long filled the post of british consul at havre died in that city september 28 1866 while we regret that our use of an extract from his travels should have unintentionally wounded