distance was thirty-five miles, and as there were no roads, I was guided
by my compass. I passed only three houses on the way. I found no one at
home, and was unsuccessful in my endeavor to get a drink of water. I
made the journey on Sunday, and a hot July day. There was no means of
getting water from the wells, as there were no pumps. Water was drawn
from the wells by a rope and bucket. I looked into the window of one
house and could see the bucket and rope in the kitchen, but the houses
were locked. So I traveled wearily on until I reached Austin, when my
tongue fairly hung out of my mouth, and was so swollen that I could not
speak aloud for two hours. I made this trip in one day. I could have
mailed the deed, as there was a stage coach carrying the mail once a
week, but I was a young man and thought I could easily walk that
distance, and then be sure that my business was attended to properly.
Two rival stage coach lines went from Chatfield to Winona. It took a
whole day to make the trip, a stop being made for dinner at a village
called Enterprise. The regular fare for the trip was $2.50. The
stagecoaches started from Madarra Hotel, Chatfield. This hotel is still
there, and is called by the same name.
Walker & Co. ran one of the lines. It was Mr. Walker who first accosted
me and said, "If you will go with me, I will take you for 50c." I
answered that I had a lady friend who was going on the same trip, and
Mr. Walker at once agreed to take her also at the same price--50 cents.
A little later I was accosted by Mr. Burbank, who had established stage
lines on the most important routes in Minnesota and he was endeavoring
to run out his rival, Mr. Walker. He asked me to go with him. I told him
that Walker had agreed to take me for 50 cents, wherewith Mr. J. C.
Burbank declared, "Well, I will take you for nothing and pay for your
dinner besides."
Judge Lorin Cray--1859.
In the early spring of '59 my father and brother-in-law started with
teams of oxen and covered wagons from our home near Oshkosh, Wisconsin,
to seek a location in the West, where homes could be had "Without money
and without price," in the great new state of Minnesota.
In October of '59 all of the earthly belongings of my father, being my
mother, seven children and a handful of household goods, were loaded
into a wagon drawn by a pair of unbroken steers, and we started for our
new home with great anticipations. Our two cows were driven behind the
wagon. My elder brother drove the steers attached to the wagon, and we,
the younger children drove the cows, and in the short period of
precisely thirty days we reached our new home in the western part of
Shelby county. Now we make the trip in twelve hours. But our loads were
heavy for the teams we had, and through Wisconsin sand and good
Minnesota mud, we made scarcely more than ten miles a day, camping at
night in and under our wagons.
The year had been a peculiar one in Wisconsin. There had been severe
frost at some time in every month during the entire summer and corn and
other produce was badly frost bitten. By October first all vegetation
was brown and dead. But there had been much rain in Minnesota, evidently
preventing frosts, and when we crossed the great Father of Waters at La
Crosse, much swollen and turbid, we were greeted by green foliage and
the freshness of spring. Vegetation was rank, grass tender, crops good,
foliage magnificent, and boy-like, I at once fell in love with
Minnesota.
We entered Blue Earth county near the southeast corner, and went as
nearly directly west as possible, passing Minnesota lake near the north
shore, camping for the last time very close to the north shore of Lura
lake, where we spent the night.
My recollection of the southern part of this county, is that it was
mostly low and level, with a wonderful growth of wild grasses. The lands
were nearly all taken and there were seen here and there settlers'
shanties, and in some places quite comfortable homes, until we crossed
the Blue Earth river west of Shelbyville, when, after leaving the
settlers' cabins in or near the river timber, the picture was wild and
dreary to the very limit. Save a few cabins and claim shanties in the
vicinity of the Mounds, one could look from the river west, southwest
and northwest, and not a sign of human life or habitation could be seen.
We were four miles from Shelbyville, and to get our mail we must go this
distance, and cross the Blue Earth river, either in a canoe or by
fording. I remember one occasion in the very early spring, when the
river was scarcely free from ice, and was badly swollen, filling its
banks, five or six of us, neighbors, started for Shelbyville on foot to
get our mail, and to hear the postmaster read the news from the weekly
St. Paul paper which came to him, there being at that time, I think, no
newspaper taken west of the river. We reached the river. The ice had
gone out, and the boat was on the other side. We agreed to draw cuts and
decide who should swim the river and get the boat. The lot fell upon
Jonah, and I have had chills ever since. I am not quite certain that the
cuts were fairly held.
Father's claim was not a very desirable one. Soon after he had taken it
a man named Sam Tait came into the country and "jumped" a claim which
adjoined ours upon the east, and was the making of a much more desirable
farm than ours. He succeeded in holding the claim. A few days after our
arrival a prairie fire came from the west and with a brisk wind swept
the whole country with a very besom of destruction. We came near losing
everything we had. Sam was a loser, quite a quantity of his hay was
destroyed. Very shortly after the fire he made us an informal call and
in language not the most polite but very emphatic, declared his
intention to leave the country at once and offered to sell us his claim.
We bought it, one hundred and sixty acres of land, three acres broken, a
small stock of hay not burned, his sod stable and board shanty. For the
purchase price we gave him a shot gun and hauled two loads of his goods
to Mankato.
This was my first visit to Mankato. We removed our shanty to our new
purchase at once. Two years ago my brother and I sold the farm for
$9600, and it was well worth it.
It seemed at first in those early days impossible to have social
relations with anyone. Neighbors as we had known them, we had none. The
nearest settlers were a mile distant from us, and there were but four or
five families nearer than two or three miles distant. But we soon
learned that we had neighbors even though the distance was considerable.
First one neighbor and then another would extend to every family in the
vicinity an invitation to spend an afternoon or an evening. Someone
would hitch his oxen to his wagon or sled, and going from house to
house, gather up a full load well rounded up and then at the usual gait
for such conveyances, we rode and visited and sang until we reached the
appointed place, where perhaps, eight, ten or a dozen persons spent the
afternoon or evening, in the one little room, where the meal was being
prepared and the table spread. There were no sets or clans, no grades of
society, all belonged to the select four hundred, and all were treated
and fared alike. Friendships were formed which were never broken, and
when recalled always revive tender memories.
August 18th, 1862, the Sioux Indian troubles began. There were no
railroads, no telegraph or telephone lines, but one stage line, and I
could never understand how the reports of these troubles traveled as
rapidly as they did. On August 19th this whole country had reasonably
reliable information of the uprising. A neighbor came to our house in
the night, neighbor went to neighbor and so the news traveled. The men
were in a fury of excitement and anxiety, the women and children were
quaking with fear. Wagons were hastily loaded with women and children,
and a little food, animals were turned loose to provide for themselves;
houses were left unlocked, oxen were hitched to the wagons, and a
general stampede was started toward the east, with all eyes turned
toward the west. No one knew whither they were going, they only knew
that they dare not stay.
A halt was made at Shelbyville, the strongest buildings were selected
for occupancy, the women and children were placed inside, and the men
acted as pickets. In our whole country there were scarcely a dozen guns.
The reports came worse and worse, and another pell-mell stampede began
for the east, some stopping at Wilton, Owatonna and Rochester. After
waiting two or three weeks, and hearing encouraging reports, some of the
more venturesome returned to their homes with their families, only to
remain a few days, and to be again driven away by the near proximity of
the Indians, and the sickening reports of their savage murders.
This condition continued until late in the fall, when, under the general
belief that the Indians would not move on the warpath in the winter, the
greater number of settlers returned to their homes to save what they
could of their nearly destroyed and wasted crops. Some never returned.
With feelings of partial security, and encouraged by their escape from
slaughter thus far, the settlers remained at their homes, under an
intense strain of anxiety, but nearly undisturbed until 1864, when the
rumblings and rumors of Indian troubles were again heard; but the
settlers were not so easily terrified as before, and held their ground.
On the 11th day of August, 1864, after quite a long period of
comparative repose and freedom from Indian disturbances, a party of six
or eight Indians suddenly appeared in the edge of the timber on the east
side of the Blue Earth, near the town line of Shelby and Vernon, and
taking wholly by surprise Mr. Noble G. Root and his two sons, who were
stacking grain, shot and killed Mr. Root and seriously wounded one, and
I think, both of his sons. These Indians then crossed the river in a
westerly direction, reaching the open country where the Willow Creek
cemetery now is. On that day Mr. Charles Mack of Willow Creek, with his
team and mower had gone to the farm of Mr. Hindman, a short distance
southwest of Willow Creek to mow hay for Mr. Hindman, and in exchange
Mr. Hindman had gone to the farm of Mr. Mack to assist Mr. Jesse Mack in
stacking grain.
Mr. Mack and Mr. Hindman were loading grain directly across the road
from the cemetery, when, on looking toward the road, but a few rods
away, they saw some Indians coming directly toward them. They both
hastily got upon the load and Mr. Mack whipped his horses into a run,
when in crossing a dead furrow Mr. Hindman was thrown from the load,
pitchfork in hand, striking upon his face in the stubble and dirt.
Rubbing the dirt from his eyes as best he could so that he could see, he
started to run and when he was able to open his eyes he discovered that
he was running directly toward the Indians. He reversed the engines
somewhat suddenly, put on a little more steam, and made splendid time in
the other direction toward the creek bed, less than a quarter of a mile
away. Once in the creek, the water of which was very shallow at that
time, he followed the bed of the creek for nearly a quarter of a mile,
and then stopped to rest and to wash the blood and dirt from his face.
Soon he left the stream and started up the bluff on the opposite side,
which was quite steep and covered thickly with timber and brush. When
nearly at the top of the bluff he came to a little opening in the brush,
and looking ahead about one hundred feet he saw those Indians
deliberately watching his approach. Utterly exhausted and unnerved, he
dare not run; he paused, and in a moment a burly Indian drew a large
knife and started directly toward him. Concluding that his day of
reckoning had come Mr. Hindman took the position of a soldier, with his
pitchfork at "charge bayonets" and awaited the approach of the Indian.
The Indian came to within a very few feet of Mr. Hindman and stopped.
Each stood, looked, and waited for the other to open the meeting;
finally the Indian turned as if to retreat, and Mr. Hindman turned again
toward the creek.
He then followed the creek bed down to the house of Mr. Charles Mack,
where he found a pony belonging to himself, which he had ridden there
that morning, and started with all speed for his own home, where he
arrived just before dark. His children were gone, his house ransacked,
nearly everything broken or destroyed, and in the meadow a short
distance from the house was the dead body of Mr. Charles Mack. By this
time darkness had set in. His wife had gone that day about two miles to
the house of Mr. Jesse Thomas to attend a neighborhood quilting. He
again mounted his pony and started across the prairie for that place.
When about one-half the distance had been made, his pony looked sharply
through the semi-darkness in the direction indicated and there about
three hundred feet away were the Indians; four of them were mounted, the
remainder on foot. Mr. Hindman put whip and spur to his pony and ran him
for about a mile, then he stopped in a valley to listen for the Indians,
but he did not hear or see them.
On arriving at the house of Jesse Thomas he found it deserted, ransacked
and nearly everything destroyed.
It proved that his children saw the Indians attack Mr. Mack, and ran
from the house and secreted themselves in the very tall grass of the
slough in which Mr. Mack was mowing, and escaped with their lives. The
ladies at the quilting had a visit from the Indians; they saw them
approaching from a belt of timber but a few rods away, and escaping by
way of a back door to a cornfield which came quite up to the house, all
of their lives were saved. The Indians secured the horses of Mr. Root,
and also those of Mr. Charles Mack, and those of Mr. Stevens whose
horses were at the place of the quilting.
No more honest men, kindhearted and generous neighbors, or hardy
pioneers, ever gave their lives in the defense of their property and
their families, than were Charles Mack and Noble G. Root.
A man was asked, why did you return to the west, after having gone back
to New York and having spent two years there? His answer was.
"Neighbors. Would you want to spend your life where the people twenty
feet away do not know your name or care whether you live or die? We used
to have neighbors in the west, but when our baby died in New York, not a
person came near us, and we went alone to the cemetery. We thought we
would come back home." How very many have had nearly the same
experience. In the congested districts it seems to be everyone for
himself. On the frontier a settler becomes ill, and his grain is sown,
planted and harvested. Who by? Neighbors. A widow buries her husband and
again the neighbors come. It is no light thing for one to leave his own
harvest and go miles to save the crop of another, but it is and has been
done times without number by those who are tried and true neighbors and
the sentiment which prompts such kindly acts counts for something some
time, and it means something in making up the sum total of happiness in
this short life of ours.
What did we have to eat that first year? Potatoes and corn. No flour, no
meat, some milk. I doubt whether there was a barrel of flour within
three miles of our home. No wheat had been raised, no hogs had been
fattened; corn and potatoes were the only food.
Mr. M. R. Van Schaick--1860.
I cast my vote for Abraham Lincoln in 1860 in New York and immediately
after, with my family, started for Minnesota, arriving in Rochester late
in the season. Our household goods were lost for some time, but were
recovered at La Crosse and hauled by oxen to Rochester.
One night a man rode into Rochester bearing the news that a thousand
Indians were on their way to massacre all the people west of the
Mississippi river. Great excitement prevailed and most of the farmers
and their families rushed into town. I sent my family into town, but my
brother and I decided to stay in our homes.
After barricading the doors and windows and loading our muskets, we went
to bed. About midnight, we heard a stealthy step outside and a moment
later someone entered the loft overhead. We sat the rest of the night
watching the stairs, but the Indian did not appear. Just at daylight, I
saw him drop silently down by the side of the house and glide away in
the shrubbery. The reason of his visit was never known.
Another time, my near neighbor, Mr. Jaffeney, who was living alone in a
log house was visited by twelve Indians on a cold stormy night. At first
he saw a dusky face appear at his window, then the form of an Indian who
silently raised the sash and crept in. He was wet to the skin and his
clothes were frozen to his body. He made no sound but sat down on the
floor near the fire; soon eleven more followed his example. The man was
much frightened, but felt more reassured when the Chief lighted a pipe
passing it to each of the twelve, and then to the Pale Face.
At the first peep of day, they silently passed through the window and
were lost in the shadows. In the early spring when they were breaking up
their camp, they left a large deer on his door step to pay for their
lodging.
Wolves and bears were plenty at this time, as well as Indians. Cattle
ran at large, and once when I was yarding my cattle, I was followed for
over a mile by wolves.
Mrs. Conrad Magnus.
Several homes near New Ulm had been burned by the Indians. The women and
children left without homes were all sheltered in a warehouse in town.
At night the men were on guard. They lacked ammunition, so I sat up all
one night melting lead in a teaspoon to make balls.
During the night an infant cried incessantly until finally we were
afraid it would cry itself to death. There was no milk to give it. At
three o'clock in the morning I said I would go out and milk the cow if
the men would guard me. Several men, with loaded guns, stood around the
cow while I got a cupful of milk for the baby.
Mrs. Orin Pike--1864.
We left Buffalo late in September, 1864 for Rochester. As we went on,
soldiers came on board the train returning to the country's service, as
they said; after a brief furlough at home; votes were then taken from
time to time to ascertain the most popular candidate for the presidency
resulting, as I recall it now, each time in a large majority for
Lincoln. This seemed to greatly disturb an elderly man and when
apparently he could stand it no longer, he denounced the government as
despotic, the draft unconstitutional, the Emancipation Proclamation as
an effort on Lincoln's part to flood the whole North with "niggers,"
characterizing Lincoln as a tyrant, who ought to be shot.
Then there stepped out into the aisle a fine looking young man, who wore
shoulder straps and in distinct tones said, "There are three things in
this world that I hate--a thousand legged worm, a rattlesnake and a
copperhead. A copperhead is the meanest of all." Then turning to the old
man he went on, "Your gray hairs have been your protection while you
abused the government. This is a land of free speech, but if you traduce
Abraham Lincoln farther, I will not be answerable for the consequences."
Votes were afterward taken but the old man was silent contenting himself
with looking mad.
Our train was gone when we reached Chicago. We stayed all night, going
on early in the morning, reaching La Crosse at dusk and leaving the cars
to take the boat for Winona. The Mississippi was very low and the night
was spent ere we reached Winona.
Monday morning we again took the cars for St. Charles. The railroad then
called Winona and St. Peter, was not completed beyond that point.
Looking from the car windows, we saw sleds and low looking wagons with
one and sometimes two large barrels in them which those who knew, said
were for hauling water. The stage took us safely to the "American House"
at Rochester.
MONUMENT CHAPTER
Minneapolis
MARY FRANCES PARTRIDGE
(Mrs. M. E. Partridge)
ANNA MACFARLANE TORRANCE
(Mrs. Ell Torrance)
Mrs. Mary E. Partridge--1854.
The pioneers were brave souls, able to cope with emergencies of many
kinds. In them, the adage was verified, "As thy days so shall thy
strength be." In 1854 I left Wisconsin, a bride, with my husband, to
begin life on a government claim in Minnesota. As we passed through what
is now the beautiful city of Faribault, there was only one frame house,
which belonged to a half breed from whom the town was named. We settled
eight miles beyond in the township of Medford in a small log cabin with
bark floors, as there were at that time no saw mills in that locality.
Soon our simple house was crowded to the utmost with relatives and
friends looking for claims in this rare section of the state. There was
a scarcity of neighbors, no schools nor places for church or holiday
meetings. It was years before I heard a sermon preached.
It was plain living in those years of self-denial. Only necessities
could be gotten, but soon all this changed. Neighbors began to settle
near. All were willing to share, ever solicitous for the other, all were
on a level, simplicity and cordiality prevailed. There were hardships,
hard labor and trials of many kinds, but these developed strength of
character. All were in the prime of life, of strong manhood and joyous
womanhood. "How beautiful is youth, how fair it gleams, with its
illusions, aspirations, dreams." There were no complaints or murmurs.
Children were welcomed gladly. To my home came three before the oldest
was four years old.
In 1857 came the hard times. Indian corn was the staple food. Few things
the farmer raised would bring money. We went without many comforts
heretofore deemed indispensable.
A little later this first home was sold and another in a southern county
better adapted to cattle raising was bought and thither we moved. With a
good beginning in horses and cattle and an experience in farming, better
than all else, the future held high hopes and bright promises, but, alas
for human expectations, the Civil War come. Already one call had thinned
the county of the younger and unmarried men. The second call sounded.
The call was urgent,
"Cease to consult, the time of action calls.
War, horrid war, approaches to your walls."
All able-bodied patriots enlisted, my husband among the number, with a
promise from the stay-at-homes to take care of the crops and look out
for the interests of the family.
Then came hardships and troubles to which pioneer life could not be
compared. I was obliged to see crops lost for lack of help to harvest
them; cattle and horses well nigh worthless as there was no sale for
them, neither was there male help sufficient to cultivate the farm,
which went back to former wildness. The government was months behind in
paying the soldiers, who at best received only a beggarly pittance. One
night, alone with my children, I was awakened by a knock on the window
and a call, "Hurry! Leave at once. The Indians are upon us, scalping as
they come." With the little ones I fled across the fields to the nearest
house, a half mile away, later, to find this a false alarm. Another time
the alarm was given and again it proved false, but was no easier borne
for it was believed the truth. All night long we were kept to the
highest pitch of terror expecting every minute to hear the awful
war-whoop. The night dragged on without this culmination.
My husband died just before the war closed. His nurse at the hospital
wrote me of his serious condition and I started at once for the hospital
in Louisville. There were no railroads in the country at that time,
stages and boats were the only means of reaching that point. To show the
contrast between traveling then and now, it took me over two weeks to
reach Louisville and when I arrived at the hospital found that my
husband had been buried a week before my arrival. The nurses and
officials at the hospital, while exceedingly busy, were most kind and
sympathetic in relating to me pleasant recollections of my husband's
last days.
I recall only two pleasant instances in the otherwise unhappy experience
of our separation occasioned by the war. These were the furloughs which
brought him home, one while he was stationed at Fort Snelling lasting
for a few days, and later when he was sent home for two or three months
as a recruiting officer for his regiment.