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Note: Belle Plain Township (Illinois) While it might not be just right to pronounce Belle Plain township the best in the county, one thing is certain, no other township surpasses it in the fertility of its soil or in the quality and quantity of its production. It is probably, taken as a whole, the most beautiful and pleasing to the eye, having neither the flat, plane-like surface of the pure prairie nor the bold hills of the river bluffs, but a surface composed of gentle undulations, full of small brooks and groves, though the latter are fast being eradicated to improve the pasturage.---Past and Present of Marshall and Putnam Counties by John Spencer Burt and W.E. Hawthorne, Chicago, The Pioneer Publishing Company 1907 Early Settlers The first settlers of the township of Belle Plain located at Martin's Grove at the head of Crow Creek. The pioneers who settled there were: James Martin, August 1829, Samuel Hawkins in 1830; Thomas Bennington in 1831; Jerry Black, Pierce Perry, Joseph and Robert Bennington, 1832; Daniel Hollenback, 1833; Nathan Patton, 1834; John Wilson, 1835; Forsythe Hatton and James Clemens in 1836; David Hester and William Hendricks, 1838; Levi Wilcox and William Hester, 1844: John Skelton made a claim in 1835 and lived on it several years but left for Iowa in 1845. Forsythe Hatton settled there with six sons, three of whom, William, John F. and Andrew, soon made claims for the their father on Section 30. John F. then located near the town of Pattonsburg on section 36. John F. Hatton was an expert hunter and bore a scar on his right arm, the result of an encounter with a wounded buck. Mark Hatton, a brother of Forsythe Hatton, settled here in 1840. He was a soldier of the war of 1812, serving under Gen. Jackson at New Orleans.
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