BIG INDIAN SCARE.
By Ballington Aydelott
The Indians were moved from this country in 1846 by the government to western Kansas, except a few who were left on the reservation in Tama county. A great many of them did not want to go, and the dragoons gathered them to Fort Des Moines with a four-mule government team. We could see a squad of dragoons with mule teams every day for two weeks hunting Indians, catching them every day and hauling them to Des Moines. Most of them were willing to go, and would pilot the dragoons and help catch those who did not want to go. Those they did not find, gathered on the reservation in Tama county and stayed there, as the soldiers were sent to the war in Mexico.
Quite a number straggled back in the fall of 1848. They said: "Masquakie heap sick out there; all die if they stay there." In June, 1849, they came in gangs of 30's and 40's. They were sullen and would not talk or give the settlers any satisfaction, but went on to their reservation on Iowa River in Tama county. By the Fourth of July they had all passed on. About this time it began to be talked among the settlers that the Indians were going to drive the whites out or kill them. This was talked of for a few days; stories began to fly thick and fast of what the Indians were going to do. None of these stories lost anything, but were generally enlarged, until nothing else was talked of but Indians and their massacres. Everybody was excited or scared. I saw men talk Indian till their teeth would chatter and their knees knocked together. The women and children were worse scared, if possible, than the men. Pretty soon some of the men took their families and left. This started the tide, and they went thick and fast for a few days. All went from some neighborhoods. They went to Mahaska, Jefferson and Lee counties. One company from the Clear creek settlement came to town and camped in the old court house, that stood on the northwest corner of the square, it was then new. They had one or two horse teams, the rest were oxen. There were seven or eight families, some time the next night the horses got scared, commenced to snort, and rattled their chains, some one yelled, "The Indians are coming!" This started the screams of the women and children. Wash. Logdon's wife fainted. This made matters worse, and such a tumult as they had! Twas a time long to be remembered.
Over half of the settlers in the county this side of skunk River left. We felt lonesome after so many had gone. Some contended all the time that there was no danger; but when the larger part of the settlers got scared and believed the reports, there was no reasoning with them. Those who stayed would gather at some house in the neighborhood at night. When they did not meet at my house I would take my wife and little six-year-old boy to the place where they were to meet, and go back home myself and get a good night's rest. I was no braver than other men, but I did not believe there was any danger. I felt as secure as I do today. The Indians were seen every day by the settlers in small hunting parties, and fishing, and sometimes called at the houses to beg for something to eat.
Three of them called when I was away from home. They walked in without speaking, frightening my little boy so he crawled under the bed, and my wife would not speak. She was one of the scared ones from the first. Finally she asked if the Indians were going to war with the whites. The old Indian could talk English, and he said, "Yes." Then my wife said, "You won't kill the innocent, will you?" "Yes, we will," he said. Then the little boy began to yell and cry. She then asked if there were more Indians coming. He said, "Yes, heap Musquakie comm' drunk." Then she thought sure she would be scalped in a few minutes. She then said, "White man Come and he kill Indian." Then the Indians were scared as bad as she was; they ran out of the house, jumped on their ponies, and went off whipping and looking back as if they expected to see the white man coming after them. They did not come to my house any more that summer or fall. As soon as they were out of sight my wife and little boy hurried to the nearest neighbors as fast as they could, expecting to see the drunken Indians any time. When she told what the Indians said, the neighbors were badly scared, and supposed they had got drunk to begin their butchering.
The news flew all over the settlement that the Indians had been to Aydelott's and threatened to kill his wife and child, and scared her so bad that she was not expected to live. Men came from all over the settlement to learn the truth. There were no drunken Indians seen or heard of. I suppose the old Indian saw she was frightened and said what he did to frighten her worse. There were no more Indians seen in our neighborhood during the scare, but the talk and excitement went on, and several log forts were built around some house in the settlement, where the women and children were taken until the scare was over. In one settlement, after they had built their fort and got their women and children together three or four days, two of the women fell out and had a fight over an old iron spoon. They than broke up and went home.
On Clear Creek they built a fort around old Joe Hint's house. He was one who believed there was no danger. He went on plowing corn and working on his farm as usual, while the neighbors built the fort. They threatened to tie him and keep him in the house. He told them they were welcome to build the fort, and bring their families and stay as long as they wanted to, but he must plow corn and take care of his farm, for there was no danger from the Indians. So the excitement went on. There was a committee of five appointed to go to the Indian village on Iowa River, and find out if they could, whether the Indians were going to break out or not. Dr. Rodgers, Joab Bennett, Brock Hammick, William Richie and Silas Dooley were the committee who went. They came back and reported that they had been to the Indian village, and seen the Indians at their home, and they seemed very friendly and sociable, and they gave no signs of hostility, and thought there was no danger.
In the meantime several petitions had been gotten up in different settlements and sent to the governor at Iowa City, requesting him to send militia to drive away the Indians. Finally the governor got so many of the petitions and found that the settlers were so excited and neglecting their work, that he sent an officer with a squad of men and an interpreter. They went and had a talk with the Indians. They found them perfectly ignorant of the scare among the whites; they knew something was wrong, but they thought that the whites were going to war among themselves. When they found out what was the matter they were as badly scared as the whites had been. They were afraid the government would drive them back to Kansas, and they would as soon die as go back there.
From that time on, they were very friendly and good to the whites. They committed no depredations that were heard of. The worst they done that I heard of was scaring my wife and son. The governor sent out a statement that he had investigated the matter and found the Indians peaceable and wanting to live at peace with the whites, and there were no good grounds for their scare. This settled it, and in a short time those who had left began to come back by one and two. We had a good deal of fun wanting to know when they would get their land warrants for the services in the Indian war, and what they would take for them. Thus ended the big Indian scare of '49.
REMINISCENCE.
BY Mrs. Mary E.S. Blanford
It was May 4, 1846, when Joseph Slaughter, his wife and four children, landed on the farm on which he now resides. The old Slaughter homestead is a well known spot, in the northwest part of what is now Mound Prairie township. Vast had been the change in the appearance of the place since that eventful day. Broad prairies, skirted with heavy growths of timber with thick underbrush, wild plum thickets and crabapple trees was all that we could see from our claim. No roads, only Indian trails. The nearest house was twelve miles away, the property of the Hon. Thomas Mitchell, in Polk county. There were others at "Tool's Point," now Monroe, also twelve miles distant.
Our house was the walls of a claim cabin, built by my father the fall before we came. Not a door or a window or even a roof, just the walls laid up of round unhewed logs. Think of us, when the spring rains came pouring down and nothing under the canopy of heaven to shelter us except the old canvas topped wagon, and well do I remember father and mother trying to hold the wagon cover down during the storms. This condition did not last long, however. Father was an ambitious man, and with a feeling of determination to make his family more comfortable, went to work in earnest and soon had his house nearing completion. He split out clapboards for the roof, hewed puncheons for the floor, chinked the cracks and daubed them with mud. The chimney was laid with sticks and mud. The upper floor, or loft as it was called in those days, was laid with broad pieces of bark, such as the Indians used for building their wigwams. Such were the disadvantages of pioneer life.
Our nearest milling place was fifty miles away, and the trip to be made with an ox team. Yet, along with the trials and disadvantages, there were some advantages. Wild game was plenty; deer, wild turkey and prairie chickens in abundance. There was plenty of wild fruit, such as plums, grapes, wild cherries, blackberries and gooseberries, and, as I remember the flavor, it far exceeded the flavor of such fruit today.
The state road, leading from Iowa City to Raccoon Forks, now the city of Des Moines, was soon established. At old Fort Des Moines there were a few soldiers stationed, acting as guards for the few white settlers to protect them from the Indians.
A description of the early days would be very incomplete without a mention of the prairie wolf that was then very much in evidence. A few of them in the night would make you think the country was infested with wolves. However, the panther, the wild cat and the catamount, which were numerous, were the most to be feared.
Our first school house was a log structure. A board attached to the wall formed a writing desk; slabs, with wooden pins stuck in for legs, formed the seats. If the children of today were obliged to attend school in a structure of this kind for a short time, they might better appreciate the advantages they enjoy, the foundation for which~ was laid by the early pioneers.
From 1846 to 1856 the implements for farming were rude indeed. Corn planting was done by stirring the ground with a small two-horse 2 plow, then crossing it with a single shovel plow; and in the check thus made the corn was dropped and covered with a hoe. Large fields of corn, however, were planted in this way. Small grain was harrowed in with "A" shaped harrows, harvested with cradles, and treaded out with horses.
RECOLLECTIONS OF 1848-49.
BY Ballinger Aydelott
It was in the year of 1848-49 that we had the "deep snow," so-called, because it was the deepest ever known before, and I am sure it has never been so deep since. The snow began falling early in December, and on Christmas morning it was forty inches on the level all over the country. As there had been no wind, there were no drifts. About the 27th there came a thaw and a fog and a crust formed. A few neighbors made paths from one house to another, but they were so far apart that most of the traveling was done on snow shoes for three months. We had no good houses. All were small log cabins, with cracks chinked and daubed with mud. All had fireplaces, with stick and clay chimneys. The roofs and doors were made of clapboards, with puncheon floors, so they did not lack ventilation. There were no stoves in this country at that time. We had no mail for three months, and therefore no news of the outside world. It was impossible to get to the Oskaloosa mill. A few had their milling done but they were soon out of bread stuff, as those who had none borrowed until it was gone. So all were soon on an equality. The rule was to divide anything we had to eat as long as it lasted. Several attempts were made to get to mill in February, but all failed, and it was not until the last of March that we got through with ox teams. So we had bread again, after living on browning and boiling corn and grating it for over two months.
After the crust formed on the snow, a man on snow shoes could catch a deer in a short time, as the deer would go through the crust every jump it made, and after a few jumps they would give up. The wolves being able to run on the crust, caught a great many and ate them. One was started near William Springer's house; it tried to run into the house, but the dogs caught it and killed it in the yard. Bt the first of March deer got so poor no one - would kill them, and many starved.
The Indians lost hundreds of their ponies that winter by starvation. The snow that fell after the crust was formed was very light and every hard wind the air was so full of snow you could scarcely see your hand before your face. At such time the snow would drive through the clapboard roof. And it was no fun jumping out of bed some mornings with snow two or three inches deep all over the house. After the hard blizzards the fine snow would blow off from the prairie into the hollows, making some of the drifts thirty feet deep. Mrs. Nancy Rickman lived in Newton that winter. I lived at that time on Elk Creek, where I first settled.
