Life in the New Home – Supplies for
the Family.
The supplying of
a large family with food and clothing, in those days, was by no means,
a small matter. Of course, we were very comfortably provided with
clothing, for the first year, that we had brought with us, but the
food had to be provided as we had need from time to time.
In the matter of
food supply, we must remember that the settlers in a new country are
generally proverbial for having good appetites, and, in our family, it
must not be forgotten that there were four growing boys, whose
voracious appetites had to be satisfied. And who that has ever had
much to do with boys, does not know their astonishing capacities in
the way of stowing away provisions? Someone has suggested that a boy
is hollow from the crown of his head to the soles of his feet, and
that his appetite is never satisfied till the whole cavity is filled.
I am a little
inclined to doubt this statement, and yet the enormous quantities of
food which an average country boy can consume in the space of a few
minutes, gives unmistakable proof that there is, somewhere within that
boy’s body, an aching void that it is not easy to fill. And when you
call to mind that there were four such boys in our family, besides
three girls, and even the parents themselves, all blest with good
appetites, it will readily be seen that the matter of food supply in a
country so remote from the markets, where such things were obtainable,
was the most difficult of all the problems that the pioneer settler
was called upon to solve. And yet it was solved, notwithstanding the
fact that it cost an amount of courage, and endurance, and absolute
suffering that few at the present day can appreciate.
There were no
mills anywhere near us, and, in fact, no grain to grind, even if the
mills had been at hand. Nearly everything that we ate had to come from
the different landings along the Mississippi river. There were no
towns to speak of. Provisions were brought up on steamboats, and small
and often inadequate quantities were obtained by the traders at these
points for the supply of the inhabitants from the interior.
Sometimes one of
the older boys with an ox team would be gone for many days searching
for provisions along the Mississippi river, and waiting for the
steamboat, and then after all would be obliged to return with scarcely
enough provisions to last till the next trip could be made. Two
bushels of corn meal, with perhaps a few other little articles, were
the reward of one trip of two weeks duration on one occasion. The
necessaries of life were not to be had in any market. Smoked bacon of
very poor quality, when obtainable at all, cost twelve and a half
cents per pound. Flour was a luxury very rarely indulged in. In
course of two years, perhaps, mills began to be erected in localities
a little more convenient, but often we had to go to Catfish mills,
near Dubuque, and then to Cascade, and other places many miles away.
I remember that
on one occasion, my brother Charles was gone so long with the ox team
in search of provisions, that we all became very much alarmed about
him. We had been having some terrible thunder storms, and mother
feared that he had been killed by lightning, or drowned in the swollen
streams. Day after day she would go to the top of the hill and look,
and long for the return of her son, but still no tidings of him came.
At last the suspense became so great that she could endure it no
longer, and so early the next morning the younger brother, Frank, was
sent on horseback to search for the absent boy. He found him near
Moscow, at the house of Mr. Brooks, sick with the fever and ague.
Having escaped it the first year, when it did attack him, it was with
all the greater severity, so that he was unable to travel. With the
help of his brother, however, he was brought home, and our anxieties
were relieved, although the supply of provisions that reached us as
the result of the long trip, was very scant, and a new expedition had
to be immediately fitted out to continue the quest for food.
Location of the Road.
The road from
Marion to Cedar Rapids was not opened and cleared of brush and logs
till 1840. It was first located as a county road, and afterwards the
territorial road, so called, was laid out over the same route. I
remember very well that when the last named road was laid out the
surveyor said that the distance from the river to the foot of our hill
was exactly one mile and a half and fifty rods.
The location of
our house was selected in anticipation of the fact that it would
probably be on the main thoroughfare between the two towns to be built
on the Cedar and at the county seat. A further consideration was the
fine springs near by and the abundant supply of timber at hand.
The First Winter.
Our first winter
in the new home would have been very comfortable, if we only could
have had our winter’s supplies all in, and had nothing to do but keep
our fire, attend to the stock, split rails, clear off ground for a
garden, and a few other little things that seemed to demand attention.
But unfortunately all our supplies had to be brought sixty miles or
more over bleak prairies, sparsely settled, and with unbroken roads,
and unbridged streams.
This was no
child’s play. It required pluck and perseverance, and not a little
suffering. Still, with all the hardships, we had a good deal of
genuine pleasure in those early days when all was new, and strange,
and full of expectancy.
Social Aspect.
The people in
those early days seemed to have an interest in each other and were
inclined to be sociable, and the fact that they lived in some cases
several miles apart, did not deter them from making frequent visits
back and forth. The deepest interest was always felt in the new
comers, and all were ready to extend their hospitality to them and
render them every possible assistance in getting them satisfactorily
located in the community.
The coming of
families was a matter of special interest to the pioneers, for the
country was already over-stocked with bachelors. In the matter of
hospitality, I think our house was no exception to the general rule.
Many a tired traveler found shelter and rest under its roof, and many
a happy group of visitors were welcomed around its ample fireside.
An Interesting Visitor.
There was one
visitor, however, whose interest seemed to extend farther, and
penetrate deeper than any other. He was a bachelor about twenty-five
years of age, somewhat crude in conversation, a little clumsy in
manner, and as timid and modest as a young girl. He seemed to be a man
of very fair intelligence, kind of heart, and every way well disposed.
He was not very animated in conversation, but when he did speak, he
usually had something that was worth saying, and to which you could
well afford to listen. He was not a man to make sport, and he seemed
to have but little taste for any kind of frivolity. And yet, he was
not insensible to a good joke, and at times could laugh quite
heartily. But, as a rule, life seemed to him to be a sober reality. He
had the reputation of being industrious and fugal, and as honest as
the day is long. He was not very quick in anything, nevertheless,
every step seemed to tell and every stroke seemed to count.
This slow,
easy-going, modest young man, as I said, was a frequent visitor at our
house, and sometimes his visits were somewhat protracted; not,
however, unduly so, for he was never known to neglect his business.
Why did he come so often? And why did he seem so reluctant to depart?
There was a special attraction for him at our home, and to the great
discomfort and annoyance of my sister Sarah, we boys discovered what
it was. It was herself.
This young man’s
name was William Vineyard, and I need hardly waste time to say
that his continued visits at our house, resulted in the diminishing of
our family from nine to eight, before the arrival of Spring. Sarah
Carroll became Sarah Vineyard. We all loved her very much,
and it was hard to have her removed from our household, even though it
was but six or seven miles away. However, the match proved a very
happy one, and none of us ever had cause to regret the choice she
made. I can recall no wedding in the county earlier than this. They
were unfortunate in being burned out in a few months after their
marriage. Everything about the house was consumed in flames while they
were absent one day, and they had to begin anew.
They soon
recovered, however, from their disaster, and Mr. Vineyard
became a prosperous farmer, and was always held in high esteem by his
neighbors as a man of the strictest integrity.
He and his wife
shortly after their marriage became active members of the Baptist
church at Marion.
Mr. Vineyard
moved west with his family many years ago, and settled in Marion
county, this State, in June, 1894.
Their large
family of sons and daughters are scattered in different States from
Illinois to Colorado.
Opening of the Farm.
The spring and
summer of 1840 were spent mostly in fencing and breaking up our land.
I do not remember that we attempted to raise anything the first year
except garden vegetables, in which we were very successful. Everything
that we planted seemed to grow with astonishing luxuriance and
abundance. During this summer we made considerable progress in the way
of opening up the farm, and in getting about us more of the comforts
of life, and so, when winter came, we were better prepared for it. But
still for several years those tedious trips for provisions had to be
made.
Plowing the Ground.
We had brought
into the new country with us such farming tools and implements as we
thought we should need in opening and improving our new farm. Among
other things we had brought a plow with us, such as we had been
accustomed to use on the farm we had left. But we had all the trouble
of bringing it for nothing. It was a cast iron plow, and in the loose,
mellow soil of this country, we found it to be of no use whatever. It
would drag through the ground like a log, simply rooting it up a
little, but turning no furrow. And so, as soon as we could, we had to
get a steel plow from Grand de Tour, Ill., which was better adapted to
the loose soil of this country. That worked so nicely that it was a
pleasure to follow it. Our breaking plow for the prairie, father had
made to order. I do not now remember where he had to go to have the
work done, but I think it was some distance away. It was of light
construction, with a steel share, and a mould-board made of rods, and
was operated with trucks or small wheels. We used two yoke of oxen for
the motive power, and my brother and I, aged respectively, nine and
ten and a half years, did the work, while father and the older boys
were busy about other matters, such as splitting rails and other heavy
work. In breaking up our land near the house, which had been covered
with a thick growth of hazel brush and small trees, we had to procure
a heavier plow and a stronger team, using four yoke of oxen instead of
two. For this purpose we had procured the heavy plow of Mr. Vineyard,
and also the two extra yoke of oxen; or to be more accurate, one and a
half yoke of oxen and a cow. The yoking of a cow with an ox to do
heavy work, seemed to us very incongruous at that time, though
afterwards, when the California emigration began, it was a very common
thing to see whole teams of four or five yoke, all cows.
This cow in our team
was a very large, fine looking animal, but worthless for milk, and so,
of course, was more ornamental than useful. This did not meet
Vinyard’s ideas as to what a cow should be, and so he determined to
make her earn her living by bearing one end of the yoke with her
stronger male companion. It proved to be a success. She did her duty
quite as well as any ox in the team. But we never could make it seem
quite right to subject a cow to such hard usage, and so unbecoming to
her sex. |
