The earliest Indian occupation known was by the Osages in the north and the Quawpaws south of the river. Contemporary with them, however it is known that there were French settlers even before 1816, as is evidenced by the fact of the deed of land on the river near Altus, given in 1816, by Jean Baptiste Dardenne, and that it was a private French survey made by himself, a survey that is still recognized. As the French had possession of ancient Louisiana no later than 1767, except for a few hours in 1804, this survey would seem to indicate a settlement of the French in Franklin territory previous to 1767, when Louisiana was under the French governorship of D'Abbadie, or before him Baron de Kelevec, or before him Marquis de Vaudreuil, or back even beyond Bienville's last term (1732 to 1741). No evidence obtainable points to settlements by the Spaniards during the rule of any of their nine governors, from Antonio de Ulloa in 1767 to Juan Manual de Salcedo in 1803. Elizabeth L. Saxon in Lippincott's for August, 1888. In 1818, two years after Jean Dardenne deeded his French survey to William Russell, Simon Miller and his son Jesse (Gen. Jesse Miller, of Mulberry City,) and others, settled in the rich Mulberry Valley, and raised one crop. This was about the region of Pleasant Hill the oldest and best known White settlement, not only in Franklin County, but in the northwestern part of the State.

The Cherokees were there, and the following year (1819) the white settlers were ordered off on account of the government arrangements with the Indians, giving the Cherokees exclusive rights of title to the territory lying between the White and Arkansas Rivers. All the White squatters who had taken up the 160 acres allowed them moved away except Jesse Bean and his family and Judge Sanders. These were allowed to remain because they were blacksmiths. Gen. Miller thinks a few others remained also. For almost a decade after that the Cherokeesa comparatively agricultural nation had exclusive control of this region. In 1818 Webber, the chief, had a small village on Mulberry, and on the south side of the Arkansas River was an Indian town called Chekelee. No information in the form of Indian tradition of the life of these people is obtainable. It may be that they had no heart to make events. The first memory I have of giving my sympathy to sorrow not directly my own, says a lady writer in a current magazine, was in the case of the Indians of the Creek and Choctaw tribes, who had been removed to the Arkansas reservation from their homes by the banks of the lovely Coosa, one of the most romantic and beautiful streams in America. Nothing my father could tell me concerning their going could ease the keen pain their sad faces and flowing tears inflicted on my childish heart.

Many burial trees were found, especially in Indian Hollow, on Horsehead Creek (East Franklin), after they left in 1828. In these were found skulls, bones, beads, gun-barrels with the wood rotted off, arrow heads, etc. At the old Kinnibrough field was found a defensive block-house of two stories. Their trails were rather numerous; they were also known as buffalo traces, and were worn about eight inches deep and a foot or two wide. The most marked trace was the one from Batesville to Ozark, generally following the Charleston road after crossing the river. One came from Madison County down to Horsehead Creek, and bore off east. Many deserted cabins and orchards were found.

White pioneers, previous to the Indian removal in 1828, looked upon this land much the same as the white population look upon Indian Territory as the promised land and after 1828, when it was deserted, settlers literally overflowed the region. Gen. Jesse Miller was one of the first to return to Mulberry Valley. Soon came Capt. Russell, the Simpsons, Barnetts, Marrs, W. H. Johnson, Quesenburys, Mayes, Moores, Maxeys and others. On White Oak were the Russels, Merediths, Ragsdales and others; about the site of Roseville were the McLeans, from which it gained its name McLean's Bottom; a little before 1831 H. B. Rose, a well-informed New Orleansite bought the place and named it Roseville; an old patriarch, called Thomas Hixon, was there; he was a Kentuckian Clay Whig, and was a great enthusiast over his favorite journal, the Maysville Ky. Eagle, a fact that made him the butt of a good deal of laughter. The court house, in Mr. Rose's residence, was soon moved up to Old Crawford Court house, about 1831 (the northwest corner of South Franklin County); here came Mr. Trimble, Mr. Dillard, Mr. Reed and Mr. Edmondson with families only four families; here came Jesse Turner, B. H. Martin and R. C. S. Brown, young attorneys; there were a few log houses; the court house was a log one 15×15 feet, with clapboard roof and puncheon floors, no hanging doors or windows. In 1832 Justin Beneaux came there with a fifteen year old boy, whom he was rearing, named J. F. Quaile, now a venerable citizen of Ozark. Mr. Beneaux had a keen eye to business as a merchant, and had been used to prompt annual settlements on the first day of a new year. At the close of his first year he prepared to receive his debtors and their coins or peltries a pleasant method of keeping open house on New Year's Day. He waited all day and they came not, whereupon he sought Judge Turner and poured out his indignation in mixed Franco-English, saying they were no punctual! no punctual! It is a characteristic fact that the first attachment case before the county court was one of his cases of collection, and that the boy he reared has become one of the first financiers of the county.

A little later (about 1832, it is thought,) William Cureton had some land on the site of Ozark then called Cureton's Ferry. Soon the Hails came in, and the growth of Ozark follows. In 1836 the movement of the court house to Old man Whitson's place, up on Big Mulberry, withered Old Crawford Court house, and for a brief period lent increased interest to the Mulberry settlement. This was not long to last, however, for although there were scattering settlers all over the present region of Franklin County (and past, too,) the great bulk of the settlement was in McLean's Bottom about Roseville, as well as in Big Mulberry Valley. Their convenience decided that Ozark should henceforth be the central and most important settlement in the county, after 1837.

The settlement of Franklin came chiefly from Mississippi, Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, Indiana, Illinois and Missouri. During the eighteen forties northern settlers located on the prairies of the region about Charleston. The population of foreign birth is of a later date, and confined almost exclusively to the German settlement north of Altus.

In the fifties there were but three settlers in the region about the site of Altus old Hogan Township; they were Old Jimmy Crusin, William Hellens, and Marcus Hogan, in whose honor the township was named. Crusin's horse mill was the only mill in East Franklin as late as 1857. The especial periods of influx of settlers were in 1829, 1836, and 1876 opening after the Indian occupation, admission of the State, and the completion of the Little Rock and Fort Smith Railroad.