ARCHIBALD CLYBOURN.
The treaty of Greenville, 1795, having restored peace on the border, Mr. Isaac McKenzie, the father, received tidings of his children, and went to Detroit to see them. The two young mothers, with their children, returned with their father to their old home, to which arrangement both of their husbands consented. A final separation was not intended, but time and distance divorced them forever. Mr. Kinzie afterwards moved to St. Joseph's, where he married a Mrs. McKillip, the widow of a British officer. Margaret married Mr. Benjamin Hall, of Virginia, and Elizabeth married Mr. Jonas Clybourn of the same place. David, the oldest son of Benjamin Hall and Margaret, made a journey to Chicago in 1822, and he remained there three years. On his return to Virginia his flattering account of the place induced a number of persons to emigrate thither. The first of these was Archibald Clybourn, the eldest son of Elizabeth, who remained a permanent resident and an esteemed citizen, well known to thousands of the present inhabitants of Chicago. His mother was Elizabeth the captive, who, with her second husband, Mr. Clybourn, soon afterwards came to Chicago. Mr. Benjamin Hall was another of the Chicago pioneers who emigrated to Chicago in consequence of David Hall's commendations of its future promise. Margaret, the captive, was his aunt, and to him the writer is indebted for the detail of Margaret's and Elizabeth's history. Mr. Hall is now a resident of Wheaton. He came to Chicago in 1830 and was the proprietor of the first tannery ever established there.
Elizabeth Kinzie, daughter of John Kinzie, became the wife of Samuel Miller, of a respectable Quaker family in Ohio. She was highly respected by all who knew her. Her husband kept the Miller House, at the forks of the Chicago River. James Kinzie came to Chicago about 1824, and was well received by his father. [James is mentioned by Mr. Kinzie in a letter written in 1821, given later in this article].
This is the romantic story taken by Mr. Blanchard from the lips of the nephew of one of the captive girls, and given in his valuable history. Some of the circumstances stated as fact may be questionable, especially the "marriage" of the girls to Mr. Kinzie and Mr. Clark. Their summary removal by their father, and their marriage to other men, considered with the marriage of Mr. Kinzie and Mr. Clark to other women, seems to cast doubt upon the occurrence of any ceremonies, civil or religious. Those relations were lightly held at that time and place. There is doubtless a "bend sinister" somewhere, but it seems unlikely that James Kinzie and Elizabeth and Samuel Miller would have left the legitimacy of the more distinguished branch of the family unassailed if it had been assailable. (It is said that Mrs. Miller did chafe under the scandal.)
In 1800 John Kinzie married Eleanor (Lytle) McKillip, widow of a British officer, who had one daughter, Margaret, afterward Mrs. Lieutenant Helm. In the same year he moved to the St. Joseph's River, which empties into Lake Michigan on its eastern side, nearly opposite Chicago, and there set up his trading-house. His son, John Harris Kinzie, was born at Sandwich, opposite Detroit, where his mother chanced to be spending a day when he made his unexpected appearance.
In 1803 John Kinzie visited Chicago, having probably learned of the approaching establishment of Fort Dearborn, and bought the Le Mai house, built by Jean Baptiste Pointe de Saible, some twenty-five years before. He moved into it with his family in the following year. From that time to his death, in 1828, he is the most conspicuous and unique figure in Chicago history, and fairly deserves the name of the father of the city. His branch trading-posts existed in Milwaukee, at Rock River, on the Illinois and Kankakee Rivers, and in the Sangamon country. To quote again Andreas (Hist. Chic. Vol. I, P. 73):