BELLE CHAMPLIN: The Great Railway Conspiracy Case

"The city (Jackson) served as the western terminal of the Central line for three years between 1841 and 1844. During this time, the city served as a prominent passenger and hotel center. Westbound passengers transferred to stage coach lines here which went to the St. Joseph River and north to Lansing. Wheat and other grains were also loaded in Jackson for transport east. A limited number of railroad car repair and track gangs became headquartered in Jackson after 1841".

-michiganrailroads.com

Erastus Champlin and other Jackson farmers were involved in a railroad war. He was indicted and incarcerated but pardoned after 3 years time.

In 1903, a sympathetic account of the railroad war was published in De Land's History of Jackson County, Michigan which may be read here in Chapter XII, A Series of Historical Events:

https://books.google.com/books?id=xa6K0zTjFUEC&printsec=frontcover&dq=HIstory+of+Jackson+County,+History+of+Michigan&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwj5sbmXmofcAhVFO30KHUH_DfgQ6AEIKTAA#v=onepage&q=HIstory%20of%20Jackson%20County%2C%20History%20of%20Michigan&f=false

The Jackson Citizen Patriot gave this account in 2012:

"JACKSON — Raw-boned courage. Vast fortunes won and lost. Towns built up overnight. Continental divides conquered.

Courtesy of Ella Sharp Museum, Jackson, Michigan

Locomotives like this plagued rural residents in Leoni, Michigan Center and Grass Lake in the mid-1850s when they killed livestock that strayed onto their tracks and railroad officials fought reimbursing farmers for their killed animals.

Such is the stuff of America’s railroad history, but it wasn’t all courage and glory when the railroad came to Jackson County. Leading up to 1851, it was a virtual battlefield between small-town farmers and corporate moguls. And a railroad, built to foster western expansion, became extremely unpleasant in the public mind.

The first half of the story played out along the Michigan Central Railroad line in southern Michigan in the late 1840s. The other half took place in a great conspiracy trial in Detroit during the summer of 1851.

Even before Michigan became a state in 1837, territorial officials had plans for a central railroad line from Detroit to St. Joseph. In 1841, that line reached Jacksonburg, now known as Jackson. Along the way, it passed through rural villages, including Grass Lake, Leoni and Michigan Center.

The state owned that first primitive railroad. There was little funding, trains were slow and tracks were poor quality. In 1846, the state sold it all to the Michigan Central Railroad for $2 million. The new company was bankrolled by eastern investors, including John W. Brooks and James T. Joy. Old rails and locomotives were replaced, rates were raised and big improvements came to the railroad, which now reached beyond Kalamazoo.

The new engines, though, were faster and thus more hazardous. The MCRR’s charter required fencing along the rails as a protective measure for people and property, but the state had little regulatory oversight.

As the 1881 History of Jackson County put it: “A year passed, yet the articles of the charter seem to be ignored. The cattle, hogs and sheep of the farmers of the district were run over by the fast trains.”

This was no small thing. In one 12-mile stretch of railroad, 160 head of livestock were killed by the trains in 1849.

Farmers sued, but the railroad offered to reimburse them only half of the value of their livestock and it appealed the cases to higher courts.

Faced with what they saw as “legalized robbery” in the courts, farmers took their case to the rails. Trains were fired upon and derailed, rails were torn up and greased with lard and tallow made “from the carcasses of their slain critters.”

Despite the railroad wars that led to the imprisonment of 50 Jackson County men in 1850, the Michigan Central Railroad survived and thrived in this area and throughout the state.

Jackson County was the heart of opposition, especially in Leoni, Michigan Center and Grass Lake. Engineers felt as though they were running a gauntlet over the 10 miles between Grass Lake and Jackson as rocks were thrown and stacks of lumber, stored along the rails for fuel, were set afire.

Shots were sometimes fired at passengers, prompting one Leoni man to spout off, “Damn ‘em, they need not ride over the road if they don’t want to be killed!”

According to Bill Haney, author of 1971’s “From Spirit Lake to Goose Lake,” Jackson County became the heart of the railroad war because of a charismatic leader named Capt. Abel F. Fitch, Leoni Township supervisor and a major property owner.

Fitch was a man of strong views, and the MCRR’s arrogant attitude toward farmers infuriated him. In the fall of 1849, he wrote to the company about farmers’ grievances, warning “if serious accidents do occur on the road, on your head, and yours alone, must rest the responsibility.”

The MCRR responded with intensified efforts to find and arrest the anti-MCRR miscreants. A reward of $500 would be given to anyone who could present evidence leading to the conviction of the guilty parties.

As many as 100 spies, many of whom were disreputable due to time spent in prison, set out to nail the culprits. Despite their intensive work, the spies failed to catch even one of the farmers in any illegal act. Even if they had succeeded, Fitch boasted that a Jackson County jury would never convict Leoni or Michigan Center men for damaging the railroad. The MCRR used its influence with the Legislature and was granted the right to seek justice in Detroit where juries would be more sympathetic to its case.

Meanwhile, the spies went rogue. On Nov. 18, 1850, the MCRR’s Detroit freight depot burned to the ground. Whether it was an act of arson or happenstance was never really known.

In any event, the MCRR offered a $1,000 reward. Conveniently, one of the spies appeared before a judge to blame the Leoni farmers. Based on his testimony, authorities swept into Jackson County one night and arrested 50 citizens and carted them off to a Detroit prison.

Thus began the great railroad conspiracy trial, an event that gave birth to a slogan still heard today — “Leoni against the world.”

Michigan Central Railroad Depot in Detroit, 1848

Bill Haney’s From Spirit Lake to Goose Lake describes two trains that came to nab Jackson County farmers that railroad officials believed were causing havoc on the MCCR lines. Squads of three or four men would hop off, sneak up to a house, and rustle out of bed their preassigned prey and cart them off.

Capt. Abel Fitch, spokesman for the railroad opponents, at first saw grim humor in the arrest of so many and their march through the Detroit streets to jail. “I, being a captain, they placed me in front, of course, and we made quite an imposing appearance giving the Detroit folks a good opportunity to take a fair view of us … must have been a great satisfaction to the RR folks,” he said. In previous years, Fitch had raised a cavalry company known as the “Barry Horse Guards.”

One of the arrested men was Ammi Filley, father of William Filley, who had disappeared from his Leoni home in 1837 and was thought to have been abducted by American Indians.

One MCRR spy claimed Filley wanted to “derail a train directly into the Dry Marsh southwest of Grass Lake to eliminate the need of coffins for the funeral,” Haney wrote in his book.

Foremost among the railroad’s spies was Henry Phelps, a Sharon farmer who had served 4 1/2 years in the state prison for horse stealing.

If the burning of the Detroit depot was an act of arson, most believed the culprit was George Washington Gay, a friend of Phelps and one of the men arrested in the initial round-up. Gay had a reputation for confessing falsely to crimes — if he could turn state’s evidence, get a reward and go free. While imprisoned, Gay confessed to setting a fire bomb that started the depot fire. He died in prison."

Next week: The Leoni men go on trial
-Ken Wyatt, Jackson Citizen Patriot

Historic Jackson Prison

A book written in 1953 recounts the story of the railroad war in which Erastus Champlin became embroiled:

In the 1850's, a small group of farmers in Jackson County pitted themselves against the wealth and power of the Michigan Central Rail Road. The M.C.R.R. was the greatest economic force in the State. It struck back through its secret agents and with the aid of the courts, it crushed what it considered to be a great conspiracy against progress and property. Erastus Champlin and sons Erastus, Lyman and William Willard were ring leaders in this fight. Erastus was a farmer in Michigan Centre and on several occasions lost animals and property to railroad destructiveness. The railroad was damned and Erastus swore vengeance one night at Filley's Tavern in Leoni Township and an enraged mob took out their vengeance by burning down a train depot at Detroit in 1850. Their trial was known as the "Great Railway Conspiracy Case". It grew out of a series of lawless acts committed against the Michigan Central Railroad culminating in the burning of the Detroit depot. On April 24, 1851, 37 of 50 men charged with that act were indicted by a Grand Jury. Among them were Erastus and sons Lyman and William Willard. The trial lasted for months and they were represented by a team of six lawyers led by William H. Seward of New York (who would later serve as Secretary of State under President Linclon, purchase Alaska from Russia). The three Champlins were convicted and each sentenced to 5 years in prison. Seward was convinced of their innocence despite their conviction believing his clients to be victims of "purchased treachery". Eventually, Erastus and sons were pardoned by Governor McLelland on March 4, 1854 as a result of a petition signed by 2,500 people and a favorable application by the railroad.

-Charles Hirschfeld, The Great Railway Conspiracy, The Social History of a Railroad War, Michigan State College Press, 1953

Following are excerpts from the prosecution and the defense arguments in a trial that captured attention nationwide. Although the railroad used ex-convicts to spy on and defame the defendants, and there was no evidence of responsibility for the arson, the popular sentiment of manifest destiny was skillfully employed in persuading the jury to convict all those who had regularly commiserated over MCRR policy at Filley's Tavern in Leoni.

William H. Seward, 1851

Argument in the Railroad Conspiracy Case Entitled The People of Michigan Vs. Abel F. Fitch and Others:

"...sentence from the Report of the Board of Internal Improvement made in 1845 while the road was still managed by the State and then tell me if it is I or the counsel who paints your fancy scenes. I refer to Joint Documents of 1846 No 4 c. "The amount paid for killing and maiming cattle is becoming enormously large. If animals are allowed to run upon our tracks, very many just inevitably be killed; and when no want of care on the part of the engineer be proven, should not the loss fall entirely upon the owner of the property destroyed." "If the owner is not debarred from collecting any portion of the loss, should he not at least share in the risk, say to the amount of one half of the damage?" Such was the policy of the State, and the latter and kinlier of the above suggestions has been the policy of the Company; and the people along the line, save only in Leoni, have generally acquiesced it it. What has been the history of the road while in the hands of the State? For years it dragged its slow length along; an incumbrance and a burthen. The State needed engines, cars, depots- every material to prosecute or sustain with energy of profit, this important work; but its credit was gone, and it was immersed in debt. Our population was thinly scattered across the entire breadth of the Peninsula. Engines dragged slowly and heavily through the dense forests. Our City numbered but 12,000 people; our State was destitute of wealth; our farmers destitute of markets; our laborers destitute of employment; and so far a the interests of the State and her people were identified with the Railroad, it presented a joyless present, a dark and frowning future.

In a fortunate hour, the State sold the road, and the millions of this denounced Company, were flung broadcast through our community; they took up the old track, relaid a better one, extended the road to the extreme line of the State- laid down at enormous cost; over 400 miles of fences to guard the property of all, save those who wanted a beef market at each crossing; multiplied the accommodation seven fold- quadrupled the speed- increased traffic and commerce, so that while in 1845 the State passed 26,000 tons over the road; in 1850 the Company passed 134,000 tons; created markets for our products, snatched the tide of passing emigration, from the hands of a steam-boat monopoly, hostile to Michigan, and threw it unto the heart of our State, until now, where heaven's light was once shut out by dense forests, it shines over fertile fields, and rich, luxuriant harvests, and the rivers of our State, which once ran with wasteful speed to the bosom of the Lakes, turn the machinery which renders our rich products available. With them Capital made its home amongst us, our credit was restored- hope and energy sprung from their lethargic sleep, labor clapped her glad hands and shouted for joy; and Michigan bent for the moment, like a sappling by the fierceness of a passing tempest; relieved from the debts and burthens, rose erect, and in her youthful strength, stood proudly up among her sister States. Who shall stop this glorious work, which is spreading blessings and prosperity around us? Who shall dare to say "this far shalt thou go and no farther?" Who shall dictate to it after doing so much? Must it now pause and rest in inglorious ease? No, gentlemen, it shall not be stayed; it shall speed onward in triumph; it shall add link after link to the great chain that binds mankind together; it shall speed onward, still onward,- through the gorges of the mountain- over the depths of the valley, till the Iron Horse, whose bowels are fire- "out of whose nostrils goeth forth smoke" and "whose breath kindleth coals" shall be heard thundering through the echoing solitudes of the Rocky Mountains, startling the live Indian from his wild retreat, and ere long reaching the golden shores of the far off Pacific, there to be welcomed by the glad shouts of American freemen at the glorious event which has conquered time and distance, and bound them by nearer chords to older homes and sister States.

A detestable Monopoly! These railroads built by united energies and capital, are the great instruments in the hand of God to hasten onward the glorious mission of Religion, and Civilization. Already is our Central Road stretching forth its hands, and giving assurance that soon shall its iron track reach across the neighboring Provinces from Detroit to Niagara; and that ere long the scream of the locomotive shall be heard over the sound of the cataract- which shall thunder forth in deafening peals, that glorious event. Our brethren on the glorious shores of the Atlantic, with whom we are bound by every interest, association and affection, will hail the shortened tie with ardent welcome. Beneath the beneficial influence of Companies like this, space is annihilated, weeks are reduced to the compass of days, and in spite of the wicked purposes of bad men, this and kindred Companies shall continue to spread and contribute to the greatness and prosperity of our country, until the earth vibrates with the pulses of her glory. But Leoni is "a rural district." It is one of the oldest settled of the State; but its statistical history tells a strange story of its progress, and bives a sad incident of its welfare. While a vast tide of emigration has poured itself into our State, while forests have become fenced, and cultivated farms- rural districts, populous ones- villages, towns and cities- in every other part of the State; in Leoni- this place of "hamlets" and "refuge of virtue" - the population has decreased- its population in 1850 being less than in 1845; a significant fact, gentlemen, and one that indicates that, if it is "a rural district" now, it will be still more emphatically a rural district ten years hence, unless a better and more law-abiding spirit takes up it abode in the hearts of that community."

-An excerpt from concluding argument for the prosecution

Old Historic Jackson State Prison

Argument of William H. Seward in Defense of Abel F. Fitch and Others:

"Gentlemen, I trust that I have proved that the conspiracy alleged in this case, presents an immaterial issue, and is false in fact".. .

Gentlemen, in the middle of the fourth month, we draw near to the end of what has seemed to be an endless labor. While we have been here events have transpired, which have roused national ambition- kindled national resentment- drawn forth national sympathies- and threatened to disturb the tranquility of empires. He who, although He worketh unseen, yet worketh irresistably and unceasingly, hath suspended neither His guardian care nor His paternal discipline over ourselves. Some of you have sickened and convalesced. Others have parted with cherished ones, who, removed before they had time to contract the stain of earth, were already prepared for the Kingdom of Heaven. There have been changes, too, among the unfortunate men whom I have defended. The sound of the hammer has died away in the workshops of some; the harvests have ripened and wasted in the fields of others. Want and fear, and sorrow, have entered into all their dwellings. Their own rugged forms have drooped; their sunburnt brows have blanched; and their hands have become as soft to the pressure of friendship as yours or mine. One of them- a vagrant boy- whom I found imprisoned here for a few extravagant words, that, perhaps, he never uttered, has pined away and died. Another, he who was feared, hated and loved most of all, has fallen in the vigor of life.

"hacked down, His thick summer leaves all faded."

When such an one falls, amid the din and smoke of the battle-field, our emotions are overpowered- suppressed- lost in the excitement of public passion. But when he perishes a victim of domestic or social strife- when we see the iron enter his soul, and see it, day by day, sinking deeper and deeper, until nature gives way and he lies lifeless at our feet- then there is nothing to check the flow of forgiveness, compassion and sympathy. If, in the moment he is when closing his eyes on earth, he declares: "I have committed no crime against my country; I die a martyr for the liberty of speech; and perish of a broken heart"- then, indeed, do we feel that the tongues of dying men enforce attention, like deep harmony. Who would willingly consent to decide on the guilt or innocence of one who has thus been withdrawn from our erring judgment, to the tribunal of eternal justice? Yet it cannot be avoided. If Abel F. Fitch was guilty of the crime charged in this indictment, every man here may nevertheless be innocent; but if he was innocent, then there is not one of these, his associates in life, who can be guilty. Try him, then, since you must- condemn him, if you must- and with him condemn them. But remember that you are mortal, and he is now immortal; and that before that tribunal where he stands, you must stand and confront him, and vindicate your judgment. Remember, too, that he is now free. He has not only left behind him the dungeon, the cell and the chain; but he exults in a freedom, compared with which, the liberty we enjoy is slavery and bondage. You stand, then, between tne dead and the living. There is need to bespeak the exercise of caution- of your candor- and of your impartiality. You will, I am sure, be iust to the living, and true to your country; because, under circumstances so solemn- so full of awe- you cannot be unjust to the dead, nor false to your country, nor to your God."

-An excerpt from the defense argued by William H. Seward, who was a candidate for the Republican party's nomination for President in 1860, served as Lincoln's Secretary of State, and purchased Alaska in the transaction known as "Seward's Folly".

Seward's entire argument for the defense may be found here: https://archive.org/details/argumentofwillia00sewa

Inlaid wooden box made by Erastus Champlin

This box came to the author from her grandmother, Leah (Way) Wall, who was the great-grandaughter of Erastus Champlin. Erastus made it during his incarceration at Old Historic Jackson State Prison.

A local Jackson artist captured the essence of the Great Railroad Conspiracy Case in original comic strips in 2010:

Thanks to theburghstrip.blogspot.com for illustrating a little known history.