Stories of hardship and privation encountered by the early pioneers are numerous, and one of the most interesting was told by J. F. Brown, an early settler of Lafayette Township.
"In 1856, I bought a span of horses in the then small and mostly log-house town of Des Moines. Later during a heavy thunder storm one night, the horses left their unfenced prairie pasture for shelter east of us in the Skunk River timber. It blew from the northwest and the next day they were seen grazing on the east side of the river. As I had no other horse then to ride, the following day I walked many miles through the tall prairie grass, but found no track of them.
"The second day, W. R. Doolittle very kindly loaned me a good horse and saddle with which I started to hunt them in earnest. I had faithfully looked every place over except the right place the day before on foot. I soon found where they pastured the day before on a fresh plat of previously burnt pasture, but not a shadow of my fugitives that day.
"The first word I got, some one saw them southeast of Nevada heading in the direction of Keokuk. The country was unfenced and horses in a strange land steer direct for their native home. I concluded the owner brought them to Iowa by way of Keokuk and so I searched diligently in that direction. Occasionally I met some one who had seen them grazing on some fresh burnt prairie grass pasture, I could not find them by getting in their advance. It was like hunting the needle in the hay mow.
"One night I took lodging with a German who could not talk English very well, so we sat up later than usual conversing in German. Before retiring he stepped out and by moonlight saw a white and a black horse passing. That was just what I was after. The one we got readily but the other was hard to catch at best and we failed to get him. However, he knew me by daylight and voluntarily came to me next morning. I captured my team in Keokuk County, southeast of Sigourney, lost two weeks' time and had left my wife alone at home to keep house and think it over in sadness, which was followed by joy and gladness. "
The story of the Schweringen (or Swarengen, as it is spelled in this version) has been told and retold, but no history of this area would be complete without it. This story is told by H. D. Ballard, who settled in southwest Howard Township in 1857.
"In the autumn of 1860, a frightful circumstance occurred. John Swarengen, his wife and four children stopped at Nevada, he stated, and bought ten pounds of cotton batting for use in their new home which they expected to reach in a short time, a few miles west of Webster City. They tied this cotton batting on top of the cover of their wagon under which was their household goods.
"They being from the east, knew nothing about what a prairie fire was, and they kept along unsuspectingly, until they reached what was known as the big rock in the north part of Milford Township. Just as they were driving out of a low place or swail where the grass was high, the prairie fire from the southwest struck them, the team turned out on the right -hand side of the road and the whole wagon was on fire instantly.
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