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Detroit 1820 BY EPHRAIM S. WILLIAMS
The fire of 1805 swept them all away, and the last of their immediate successors, the famous Campau house, disappeared a few years ago from the site, No. 140 Jefferson avenue, now occupied by the stately Palms building. Mr. Campau is said to have built upon or very near the ground occupied by Cadillac's headquarters. Between this and the southwest corner of Griswold, upon the north side of the old Ste. Anne's street, of 15 feet width, and within 20 feet of the present south line of Jefferson, stood the later Ste. Anne's church, built in 1723 of logs, with two modest spires and two bells. It followed its predecessors in a fiery ordeal; and its successor upon the same site, built in 1755, was burned in the fire of 1805, but men are still alive who can remember the ruins that long marked the spot. The first Catholic cemetery in Detroit adjoined the church directly in the modern avenue. All burials previous to 1723 were probably in the military cemetery, just back of the First National Bank.
Still standing upon Jefferson avenue and looking westward to the intersection of Second, one could formerly have seen the sparkling waters of the Detroit, as they here came up to the high bank that formed the front of the Cass farm. In those days the river margins of the Cass, Jones, Forsyth, Labrosse, Baker and Woodbridge farms abutted on a beautiful though not deep bay, long since destroyed by the filling and "made ground" which began with the improvement of the Cass farm for residence and business. The banks were high with a good road near the brink, and furnished a favorite promenade and driveway to the Detroiters of bygone generations.
Detroit Michigan
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