LAKE SUPERIOR COUNTRY page-11

The saloons were open night and day, including Sunday. There was much drinking, much blasphemy, much fighting. The Cornishman hated the Irishman. They were inveterate enemies; their feuds were endless. At times the opposing factions would muster in force, attacking with clubs and stones. There were many broken heads, crippled legs, with occasional manslaughter. The law officers were powerless and the peaceful citizen could only hide himself in his house till the storm blew over. It was much worse in every way in winter, when the people were completely isolated, with no possibility of aid or protection from outside communities. Then the roughs, maddened with whisky, ruled the roost; they indulged in strikes, in the agreeable pastime of beating and maiming friend or foe, with threatened arson and downright murder. During the first two years of the war on the Union, in winter, Portage was a veritable pandemonium, where all the bad passions of embruted and lawless human nature had full swing. The steady citizen and mine managers had a hard time of it. They carried arms and were ever in jeopardy of life and property. For better protection, in 1862-3 secret societies were-formed, muskets were procured from the State, and squads of mine officers were nightly drilled in private upper rooms. But the facts leaked out and the roughs were intimidated. No actual conflict took place between these drilled men and outsiders. When the war on. the Union became a dead certainty the new and struggling mine industries of Portage Lake seemed destined to destruction. It was predicted that the mines must close down because there would be no market for copper.

Tagged as: Portage Lake