CHAPTER VII.
PYMOSA TOWNSHIP.
In the spring of 1851, when Jeremiah Bradshaw and his party were prospecting through Audubon county, just prior to their location at Cold Spring, the grave of the old Pottawattamie chief, Pymosa, for whom the townshp received its name, was in the last stages of dissolution. The Mormons, who had seen the tomb before it had crumbled away, said that it was encircled by two fences, one within the other, with openings on the western and eastern sides of the mound.
When the Bradshaw party reached the location of the grave, which was between Oakfield, Audubon county, and the Cass county line, the skeleton of the noted chief, which had been placed in a sitting position against the stump of a tree, was encircled by the crumbling mound of earth, and only the posts of the fences were standing. Victor Bradshaw, who had paid some attention to archaeology, took the skull from the skeleton and going back to camp told the folks that he had found "an old fashioned gourd." As his mother did not like the idea of keeping it, when she found out what it was, the young man threw it away. He afterward returned for it, but the skull had disappeared. It is said that when Pymosa was buried, his gun and other personal effects were placed in the mound.
"Compendium and History of Cass County, Iowa." Chicago: Henry and Taylor & Co., 1906, pg. 112.
Transcribed by Cheryl Siebrass, January, 2014.
