On the 4th of July, 1778, two years after the declaration of Independence, Col. Clark, between whom and Boone the honor of founding Kentucky is divided, with a small band of frontier soldiers, surprised Kaskaskia, then garrisoned by the British, and shortly afterwards made himself master of Cohokia, without bloodshed. He first brought to the inhabitants intelligence of the alliance between the Americans and their former liege, the King of the French, which was received with rapturous enthusiasm, so galling and unwelcome had been the British yoke. Les long Conteaux, as the Kentuckians were called, and les Bostonias, as the Yankees were called were thenceforth welcome.
The attachment which the Indians always manifested towards their great Father of France, in opposition to the British rule, was quickly transferred to the Americans. In October, the House of Burgesses of Virginia erected the country north of the Ohio into the county of Illinois, over which they placed John Todd, of Kentucky, Governor. Two companies, raised in the French settlements, accompanied Clark in his famous expedition against Vincennes. In 1783, the treaty of peace was concluded, by which the western boundary of the enfranchised Colonies was declared to be the Mississippi. In 1784, the North West Territory was ceded by Virginia to the Confederation Congress. In 1787, it was organized by Congress, but no government was established in Illinois until 1790. This consisted of a Governor, three Judges and a Council, who combined executive, judicial and legislative authority. In this year, the county of St. Clair was organized.--From 1783, when the country passed from under British rule, to 1790--a period of seven years--no government of any kind existed in Illinois. In 1809, Illinois, then including what is now Wisconsin, was organized as a first class Territorial Government, the people electing a House of Representatives, and the President and Senate appointing the Governor and Council. Ninian Edwards was the first Governor and Nathaniel Pope, both of Kentucky, the first Secretary. In 1812, war was declared between the United States and England. Soon followed the surrender of Detroit, by Hull, and the Chicago massacre. At this time no settlement existed in Illinois, north of Alton, except the small French settlement of Peoria. An expedition, in which the present Buchanan candidate for Superintendent of public instruction, John Reynolds, the "Old Ranger," participated, attacked and destroyed an Indian village on the bluff, at the head of Peoria Lake. On the 24th of Dec. 1814, the treaty of Ghent was signed. In July, 1815, a treaty was made at Portage des Sioux, a short distance above the mouth of the Missouri, between the American Commissioners, consisting of Gov. Clark of Missouri, Gov. Edwards of Illinois, and Auguste Chouteau of St. Louis, and the various Indian tribes of the North West, except the Sacks and Foxes, under Keokuk and Black Hawk, who refused to come to the treaty ground. Two years afterwards, at St. Louis, a treaty was made with these tribes, an alleged violation of which led to the Black Hawk war in 1831 and '32. From this time to 1820, emigration poured into Illinois. It was almost entirely from the Southern States, and stopped south of the Sangamon. The population of Illinois was in 1790, about 2000; in 1800, about 3000; in 1810, 12,284; in 1820, 45,000; in 1830, 157,447; in 1840, 478,929; in 1850, 853,317; and in 1855, 1,300,000.