In December, 1852, Gilman Folsom is a very busy man. He is an attorney, overseeing his law practice in Iowa’s state capital, Iowa City. He has also just been re-elected to the Iowa House of Representatives, and his ferry business, which he took over from his late father-in-law, Pleasant Arthur, in 1845, is booming.
In the early 1850’s, Iowa City was the jumping off point for the West, and with the recent Gold Rush in California, hundreds of fortune-seekers are lined up on the eastern shore of the Iowa River on a daily basis, at the foot of the Stone Capitol, to take Folsom’s ferry across the Iowa River. By May of 1853, Gilman will be applying for a license to build Iowa City’s very first toll bridge located at this same ferry-landing, positioned perfectly on the National Road crossing. Read more here.
Sometime, right before Christmas of 1852, a letter arrives in Gilman’s mail. It’s the letter you see below. Dated December 10, 1852, it’s a personal, hand-written letter from a concerned man from Oregon, Illinois.
The hand-writing on our letter is difficult to read, so our best guess is that this letter is from a gentleman in Oregon, Illinois named: S.A. Irvin. In his letter, S.A. explains that he has…
…a matter that I wish attended to in your city… induced to write to…
…track down one Boyd Wilkinson.
Apparently, other men living in the area – Jones and Eastman of St. Charles, IL – Kane County – have been duped by Wilkinson as well, and are in the process of securing legal help from James Harlan, another attorney in Iowa City. S.A. shows an urgency in writing Mr. Folsom, wanting to get to the head of the line before others win back their debts from this “slippery fellow.”
Records show that Boyd Wilkinson, born in 1820 in Beaver County, Pennsylvania, was married to Harriet A. Vescelius (1847) in Ogle County, Illinois – Oregon is the county seat – and had two of his five children in Ogle and nearby Kane County in 1848 and 1850 respectively.
S.A., in his letter, is giving Gilman complete freedom to do whatever he can to settle this long-standing legal issue, and, of course, $90, in 1852, is quite a bit of money for most average citizens.
Unfortunately, we don’t know how S.A.’s legal matter turned out. We don’t know if Gilman Folsom stepped in and got a fair settlement in 1852/1853, but from reading all the accounts from 1858 (above), we do know, for a fact, that Boyd Wilkinson was indeed, a “very crafty and slippery fellow” who obviously kept up his questionable conduct until it finally cost him his life on May 11, 1858, at the hands of a mob made up of fellow Iowa Citians! Historian Erik McKinley Eriksson writes this…
Philip Clark – one of Iowa City’s first settlers – seems to be at the center of this Iowa City murder mystery. Click here to read more about Clark and his rich Johnson County history. Iowa City historian Irving Weber describes this “sensational Iowa City story” in his own creative way – BTW – Weber did not report the correct year, however. All these events occurred in 1858 – not 1859.
So, there you have it. Our letter from December 10, 1852 certainly gives an early indicator – nearly six years before the May 1858 tragedy – that Boyd Wilkinson was up to no good, and that S.A. Irvin had him pretty well pegged when he tells Gilman Folsom to be careful when dealing with this “crafty, slippery fellow” who, apparently, couldn’t swim as well as he swindled!
Kudos to the amazing resources below for the many quotes, photographs, etc. used on this page.
Wilkinson’s Body Found, Davenport, Iowa Daily Gazette, May 26, 1858, p 2
Boyd Wilkinson, Find-A-Grave website
Gilman Folsom, The Annals of Iowa, Volume 1872 – Number 4, 1872, pp. 298-301
Gilman Folsom, Find-A-Grave website
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