St. Charles City Republican intelligencer. [volume] (St. Charles City [Charles City], Iowa) 1857-1861, 1860-06-21
Letter from Vermont.
PRocroRsvuLE, Windsor Co., Vt,
June 4th, 1860.

such wholesale Misrepresentation
That individuals in Iowa and other
Western, Middle, or even Eastern
States can be found who have suffered
much from the terrible stringency in
business matters since 1857, is quite
true, but in every nine cases in ten !
am confident the principal or imme'
date cause proceeds from their own
folly in making too much haste to get
rich. Men who invested all they had,
and borrowed of their friends to in
vest, promising 20 or 25 per cent. in
tcrest, may be glad to sell lands that
cost them $40 per acre for 81, to save
their being sold for taxes, and it is
possible and perhaps probable that
some such isolated cases exist in Iowa,
but to the extent asserted by the OBJ
servers correspondent, is reproachlul
and untrue. What city in your State
in 1851 had population of 10000
and is now reduced to $4,000? With
such comments as you may make,
please mail number to the Observer
and Bellows Falls Times. | have
two reasons for the request, first to
correct a gross falschood, and more
particularly to show the publishers of
said papers that in at least one coun-
ty in Iowa a lire paper is weekly is
sued, showing at least as much actual
life and business, as in many of the
long settled counties of the New Eng,
land States.
You, of course, can say, to my
knowledge, that unimprovcd lands in
Floyd County have, within the last
year, been sold for from $3.50 to $l2
per acre, and doubtless will be again.
Very truly,
CALVIN FRENCH.
l should like to have every editor in
Iowa notice this beautiful specimen
of reraeity. c. F.
SAD Picture OF MATTERS IN Iowa.
The Lexington (Ky.) Observer prints
the following as an extract of letter
from a gentleman of high standing in
Iowa. 1t gives a melancholy view of
the condition of affairs in that State !:
ado not trade for anything in the
way of real estate within the limits of
the State of Iowa, with the view of
selling it at any price within the next
five years. The value of land is nom
inal you may count it at 81, rs or
$40 neither price would bring cash.
| have just sold lands, bought in the
county north of this, for which | paid
$40 in 1857, good lands, at 81 per
acre, and that in trade. l consider
lands anywhere within the limits of
this State, unimproved, dear at over
81 ,25 per acre, except in counties bor-
dcring on the river.
"No man living in your State can
have anything like correct idea of
the utter hopclcssness of the state of
things in Iowa. Speculation has been
u"v rum va ,"o o,as.. I'll ,.;-,o~t towns
are SO fiat that they can never get up
again until there is an entire change
of population. This place containing
a population, in 1857, of 10000, is
row reduced to $4,000, and people
leaving just as fast as they can get
money to get away upon. The place
is in debt one mliion aud a quarter and
she as well as Dubuque ct al. along
the river, are now talking of rcpudia-
ting So do not own lands in Iowa
if you can avoid it. 1t will make you
that much poorer"
Judge French, who sends us the
above, has several times visited Iowa,
and knows whereof he aflirms. He
knows that such statements as this
from the Lexington Observer are H.
bclous and false, and are calculated
to do much harm to our young State.
Were Iowa editors to undertake to re-
flute 1.-THE of these calumnies, they
would have a vast amount of work
upon their hands but in Difference to
our friend the Judge, we will expose
"by irrcfragible facts and arguments =
some of the absurdities and falschoods
of the Observer article. The act al"
in it shows plainly that the writer is
some unfledged lawyer, who, it would
seem,undertook to live by his wits and
failed for want of capital. Very proba-
bly, he is kentuckian who never trav-
elled fifty miles in Iowa, and knows
as little of its topography, and the So
cial and financial condition of its pco-
pie, as do the Hottentots AS to the
10000 population it is all Josh. There
is not now, and never was, a city in
Iowa containing population of that
and there is not city of
Iowa which at any former period con-
tanned a larger population than it does
to-day. Tho city Of Dubuque con-
tains a population of about 1900
Davenport, $4,000 /; Muscatine, 1000
Burlington, 5000 !; Keokuk, 10000.
By reference to the census returns
Of this State, we find that, in 1856,
the entire county Of Dubuque, (em-
tracing the city by that name con-
aimed 1851 inhabitants and the
tate census of 1859 shows that Du-
'uque county then contained 3O,5Sl
inhabitants. The county of Scott,
embracing the city of Davenport,
in 1856, contained a population of
p ,52l in 1859 it contained 25,SGl.
Muscat'ne county embracing Musca-
tine city, in 1856, contained 1860
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