He had a profound impact on Presbyterianism in the Northwest Territory, helping to establish at least six churches in Iowa and Illinois, and acted as a delegate in the General Assembly of 1861, which voted on the Gardiner Spring Resolutions, named after his brother Gardiner, and thus gave the assent of the Presbyterian Church to Abraham Lincoln's moves to keep the Union together.
After his father's death in 1819, Charles moved south to Boston, and went to work as a merchant, dealing in silk goods and textiles.
In 1837, the Springs went west as part of the Great Migration, and settled first at Rock Island, Illinois on the Mississippi River.
At the time, the journey from New York to Illinois took one month, and was made by the way of the Erie Canal and then the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers.
The Spring farm at Rock Island, in 1850, was spread over 100 acres, and had in the way of livestock 2 horses, 16 milch cows, 20 other cattle, and 20 swine, which produced 400 lbs of butter.
While in Chicago, Charles Sr. became superintendent of the Sunday school at the North Presbyterian Church, and there met the inventor Cyrus Hall McCormick, whose mechanized reaper did for the Midwest what the cotton gin had done for the South.
[1] In 1861, Charles was a delegate to the Presbyterian General Assembly in Philadelphia which considered the Gardiner Spring Resolutions propounded by his brother, Rev.
The assembly finally approved the resolutions, which meant the church would stand behind Abraham Lincoln's attempts to keep the Union intact.
[1] Charles Sr. repeatedly tried to convince McCormick to carry out one of William's last wishes, which was to found a home for young girls (age 5–10) to save them from “destructive Parental & other influence” and to clothe, feed, and educate them in a religious environment.
According to Hutchinson, McCormick's biographer, Charles believed that “too much emphasis was placed upon punishment, and not enough upon the prevention of crime.
[1] By 1868, Charles's eyesight was failing, but he was still farming, living most of the year with his daughters Edwina and Frances and sons George and Winthrop in Manteno.
"[1] In 1877–1878, Charles retired and moved to Le Mars, Iowa, where his son Winthrop worked as a McCormick reaper agent, his son George owned a hardware company, and where his daughter Edwina soon married Byron Mudge, a Civil War pensioner.
In 1884, at the age of 84, Charles caught a white Pacific crane on the Arkansas River which measured 6 feet and 4 inches from beak to toes.