THREE GENERATIONS OF RACHEL.
1, Mrs. Dunavan (daughter); 3, Mrs. Hum, 4, Mrs. Watts and 8, Mrs. Rogers (grand-daughters); 5, Howard and 6, Gladys Hum and 7, Baby Watts (great-grandchildren); 2, Samuel Dunavan (son-in-law).
It has been asserted—and published in books, that Congress voted gifts of money to the girls; but in answer to an inquiry made at the United States Treasury, the author was informed that no such appropriation has ever been made, and Mrs. Dunavan says that she never knew of her mother’s receiving any money from the government.
In 1877 Mr. Munson erected a very handsome monument on the spot where his wife’s parents and the others who died with them were buried. It is a graceful shaft.
In 1905, through the efforts of friends of the persons who were massacred at Indian Creek on May 21st, 1832, the Illinois legislature appropriated the sum of five thousand dollars to place a monument at the grave where the victims were buried.[42] On August 29, 1906, the new monument was dedicated with much ceremony, music and orations. Among the speakers were the venerable Hon. John W. Henderson and his brother, Gen. T. J. Henderson, who were boys at the time that the massacre occurred, the former being one of the persons who were planting corn south of the Davis cottage on that day, and who with John W. Hall escaped to Ottawa.
[42] Laws of Illinois, 1905, p. 42.
A full account of the dedication will be found in the newspapers and in the records of the Illinois Historical Society.[43]
[43] “Ottawa Journal,” August 30, 1906; “Bureau County Republican,” August 30, 1906; XII., “Transactions of the Illinois State Historical Society,” p. 339.