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June 6, 1940
Interesting
Incidents in Early Crawford County History Related by Pioneer
Citizen
by E. A. Wolfe
The French were the first
white people who possessed this country. The first regular
settlements made in Crawford county were in and around Palestine.
There is a tradition that the first settlers found an old Frenchman
named LaMotte living near the margin of the prairie which still
bears his name. But little however, is known of him or his residence
here. There is no just ground for controverting the statement that
LaMotte actually lived in what is now Crawford County, especially
when we consider the fact that LaMotte Prairie, LaMotte Creek and
Fort LaMotte, the latter the site of Palestine, all bear his name.
It is not known with perfect
certainty present day who were the first actual settlers from the
states to locate within the present limits of the county. It is a
generally accepted tradition, and is now a tradition only, that the
Eatons were the first of our own kind to occupy this portion of the
county, and are believed to have been here as early as 1808. The
Eatons were Benjamin, Joseph. John,
Stephen, Richard, Daniel and Martha. They
were genuine pioneers and frontiersmen and were the Fort at
Palestine.
The blockhouse or fort had
been erected here about the commencement of the War of 1812. and in
the fall of 1814, there were twenty-six families within its
protecting walls and ninety rangers under command of Captain Andrews
who were stationed there for the purpose of guarding these isolated
settlers. The Eatons disagreed with some of the other inmates of the
fort and withdrew and built another fort about one mile northwest on
land now owned by Will Rousch. This fort was named
Fort Foot,
from the fact that the Eatons possessed extraordinarily large feet.
‘The late William Eaton of northwest of Robinson was born in
this fort at what date I don’t know—but before 1818. He has quite a
number of descendents living. Bert Hall of Robinson and
Harvey Hall of Burner vicinity are grandchildren.
When h heat settlements were
made in this region there were still many Indians roaming through
the country. They were generally friendly toward the whites except
for a short period during the War of 1812 when they became somewhat
excited and committed depredations upon the whites, such as steeling
horses and other stock, and in a few instances murdering their
pale-faced neighbors.
In the year 1818 John
Eaton, wife and child moved from the fort to the farm where
Grand Prairie Church now stands and built a log cabin which was yet
standing until recently.
Evert Eaton,
a grandson, and wife and a daughter and her husband now live on the
farm. John Eaton or Uncle Johnny, so he was commonly called,
told your writer that the Indians would come to his cabin in bands
of fifteen or twenty at a time, open the door and walk in, silt down
on the floor and want something to eat and wouldn’t leave until they
got it.
He said that early one
morning eighteen Indians came to his cabin seeking something to
eat. His wife had just baked a large corn pone for breakfast and
removing the lid of the old fashioned oven, he said he pointed at
the pone. The Indians understood the gesture and one of their
number thrust a knife into the steaming bread, took it from the
oven, laid it on the table, and dividing it, each took his piece and
left munching the food with grunts of satisfaction, leaving the
family without any bread for their breakfast.
He also related that while
they were yet at the fort one night the Indians stole a number of
horses from the settlers, including several of his father's horses.
The next morning they organized a company with Captain Houston
as their leader to go in pursuit of the Indians to recover their
horses. He said they found their trail and followed it past where
the Oak Grove Church now stands, and on all next day, and on
until near sundown they saw and Indian village of what looked like
several thousand Indians about where the city of Champaign now
stands. He said they decided to let them keep the horses and
[started] back, glad to make their escape before they were
discovered.
Uncle Johnny also told of he
fight with the "Redskins" at the big pond north of Palestine when a
bunch of the men from the settlement went to the pond to get some
timber and were ambushed and fired upon by the Indians.
Mr. Eaton told of the
Hutson massacre south of where Hutsonville now stands. Isaac
Hutson was a native of Ohio but had been living in what is now
Turman Township, Sullivan County, Indiana. Hutson one day crossed
the river and visited the section now known as LaMotte Prairie.
Being attracted by its beauty and fertility, he resolved to move
hither. Accordingly, in the latter part of the winter of 1812, he
built a cabin at the north end of the Prairie near where Henry
Mehler [?] now lives on land now owned by Charley McCoy,
to which he moved his family in the spring. A man named
Dixon
settled nearby about the same time.
Hutson's family consisted of
a wife and six children, the oldest a girl of sixteen. One day
Hutson went to Palestine to mill and did not get started for home
until nearly night. When about half way to his cabin he noticed and
unusual light in the direction of it. Fearing the worst, he urged
his horse at full speed. Upon nearing his house his worst fears
were realized. His entire family had been murdered by a band of
Indians and his house burned. A few rods away from the fire lay the
body of Dixon mutilated almost beyond recognition. His breast had
been cut open and his heart taken out and placed upon a pole in the
ground nearby. Satisfying himself that the havoc was complete and
having lost all for which he cared to live, he swore revenge and to
this end he joined the army at Fort Harrison near where Terre Haute
now stands. Shortly after he joined the army, he was killed in a
fight with the Indians south of the fort. "Pet," a friendly Indian
told Mr. Eaton that Mrs. Hutson was boiling a kettle of soap and had
her babe in her arms when the Indians made the attack. They took
the babe and threw it in the kettle of boiling soap and then killed
the rest of the family.
John W. Barlow
came from Kentucky and stopped two years in Indiana and in the
spring of 1816 came to LaMotte Prairie. He settled on the place
where the Hutson family were massacred. Hutson's cabin had been
burned by the Indians but there was an old stable still standing.
In this Mr. Barlow sheltered his family while preparing his cabin
and while they still occupied it a child was born to them.
Literally it was "born in a manger" and was doubtless the first
birth in the county. There is a cedar tree yet standing on the site
of the Hutson cabin and massacre.
The Indian tribes that were
here were the Delawares, Kickapoos, Shawnees, Kaskaskias and
Plankeshaws with many fragmentary bands of other tribes.
Of these the Delawares were
the most powerful tribe. The best title had belonged to the
Kaskaskias and it was of them the Government acquired its title.
But all, Indian-like, were roving hunters, nomadic in all their
habits. The Indian and his cogeners, the wolf and the green head
fly, the bear and the deer, and the panther have gone and one has
left like the other, nothing but a memory.
The following families, so
far as we can learn, were among the first srttlers: Woods,
Kitchells, Colloms, Woodworths, Hutsons, Lagoes, Brimberrys, Wilsons,
Waldrops, Piersons, Kennedys, Houstons, Dr. Hill, Eatons and the
Newlins. They came in the years 1808, 1809, 1810, 1911 and 1812.
They were in the Fort.
The pioneer cabins were
built of small logs and covered with clapboards, upon which were
placed weight poles to keep them in place, nails being out of the
question. the chimney which occupied a large portion of one end of
the house, was built on the outside, of stick and clay and they had
dirt floors. The size of the cabins can be determined from the fact
that four bearskins cut square covered the floor and made a
luxurious carpet. Window glass was unknown in the early cabins. A
hole in the wall was left for light. Social life first was confined
to house raising and weddings. That is, these succeeded the days of
"forting." The fun at these was boisterous and rough, but innocent
as the day was long. Somewhere in about these days a great drink
called "metheglin" was here. This was made in every household when
they took the winter's honey crop and was simply the water of the
waste honey made very sweet by putting it in a place with exactly
the proper temperature where a slight fermentation took place. It
was then ready to drink. But the good old metheglin days and times
are gone.
Then the weddings. That was
the great affair of the day. At the house of the bride was
commotion and a gathering of the neighbors' girls for days before
the great event. Pumpkin pies, apple pies, bride's cake, sweet
cake, and cakes, raisin cakes, float, chicken, and hams boiled by
the cauldron and kettleful and still more hams and cake and pie and
float.
The morning of the great day
came, and the watchman from the house of the bride called out “
behold the bridegroom commeth.” Then there was swift mounting of
all about the premises who rushed out to meet the groom and his
party and put forth their swiftest horses and safest rider in the
“race for the bottle.” The party with the groom accepted the
challenge and sent forth their best horse and rider. A straight
stretch of road about a half mile usually, was selected, judges
posted, the riders mounted and the race run. The winner then was
handed the bottle and all its fluttering ribbons and the cavalcade
rode to the house of the bride in great glee. But the “race for the
bottle” has passed away and there are people now who never heard of
this innocent pastime.
The after the wedding dinner
came the dance, and they literally danced at the weddings, fiddle or
no fiddle. They commenced early in the afternoon of the day of the
wedding and danced until breakfast next morning. Then they caught
their horses and in pairs rode to the groom’s father’s residence and
as soon as a great “infair” dinner was over, resumed the dance, and
all night until a late breakfast again the next day. “Infair” day
sometimes extended over two or three days and the whole thing was
dancing, dancing, with only cessation for eating. And what
dancing! Not your dreamy waltz, nor gentle walk, but a genuine
walk-talk, ginger blue, breakneck race and jig, that filled their
innocent hearts with gladness but their legs with soreness and pain.
Among the diversions of the
early times were shooting matches for beef, turkey, whiskey and
sometimes for wagers of money. When beef was shot for it was
divided into five quarters, the hide and the tallow being the fifth
and considered the best. The women frequently attended these
shooting matches with a neat clean keg of metheglin to sell. It is
a pleasant drink and has no power to intoxicate.
In the early days horse
racing was a kind of mania with almost all people and almost all
indulged in it either by being spectators or engaged in them.
When the first settlers came
here, wild game of all kinds was plentiful with the exception of
buffalo and elk, they having drifted to the west of the Mississippi
and beyond. This country was once the regular ranging place of the
buffalo and a fact not known to many people in that with the
disappearance of the buffalo disappears invariably the buffalo
grass. Hence this peculiar grass must have at one time prevailed
all over these prairies and as the buffalo crossed the Mississippi
not to return, his grass seems to have followed him.
Deer, wild turkey, prairie
chicken and all smaller game were here in abundance. Bear meat was
plentiful, some of the settlers killing four or five a week.
Venison was not a rarity in a household where the head of the family
has been known to kill 19 deer before breakfast. A saddle of
venison (both hind quarters of a deer not cut apart) was worth 25
cents, but not much sale for it at that. Wolves, bear, panthers,
and wild cats were here in great numbers.
The commercial poverty of
the country in its first settlement is shown by the fact that the
smokers made their own clay pipes when they became too aristocratic
to use a corn cob pipe. Such a thing as a cigar was unheard of.
Tallow candles made by dipping in melted tallow were first used for
illumination. When the iron lamp was introduced with its hook to
hang on a nail and its sharp point to stick in the crack of the
logs, it was deemed a great invention. When filled with coon or
bear’s oil it made a splendid light.
Men and women both wore
buckskin clothing. The young ladies of the period wore deerskin
dresses. The hair was removed and the skins dressed with deer’s
brains so as to be soft and pliable, and when colored yellow with
hickory bark and alum, or red with sassafras, made a rather stylish
looking outfit. The number of “breadth in the skirt,” were about as
few as in the tight fitting figure displaying the costume of the
super-fashionable belles of the present day. The men wore buckskin
breeches and jackets. The daily food of the pioneers was cornbread,
hominy, bear meat, venison, honey and sassafras tea. The corn meal
was made by pounding corn in a stump mortar. A stump mortar was
made by cutting off a tree about three feet from the ground and
burning or digging a hole a foot in diameter in top of the stump.
Into this the corn was placed and a hard hickory pestle or iron
wedge attached to a spring pole was used to pound it fine, and was
then sifted through a homemade sieve made by stretching a deer skin
tanned with ashes over a hoop. The holes in the sieve were made
with a small iron instrument heated hot. The smaller the iron the
finer the meal. That portion which went through the sieve was
called meal, that which remained used as hominy. As civilization
advanced, homemade horse hair sieves came in fashion. The bread
stuff for each day was pounded up before breakfast.
Bears were so bold they
have been known to come within twenty steps of the house and carry
off pigs. Their skins were very useful for making moccasins. Bear
skin moccasins were made with the hair-on (turned inside) and for
men, cut about as high as socks, for women, about the length of
stockings.
A few years later shoes and
stockings became fashionable, but they were too highly valued for
wearing even a whole Sunday. The girls would carry them tied up in
their handkerchiefs until near the church or farmhouse where church
was held. They would then take a seat on a log, don their shoes and
stockings and go into the house with as much of a dressed up feeling
as a city belle of today alights from her car to enter the opera.
The first wagons of the
pioneers were called “truck wagons.” The wheels were sawed out of a
large log and were a solid piece of wood with a hole in the center
for the axel. Soft soap was the only grease ever used on them, and
when a little dry of soap their “hullabaloo” could be heard for
miles as they passed along the road.
Then too, this was the day
of the one long bedstead. To many folks of today this will seem
strange and impossible. All or nearly all, of the pioneer log
cabins were finished with a one leg bedstead. To start with you
must have an unplastered log house, then a post and two bedrails.
Each rail is fastened in an auger hole in the wall. The sides of
the house wall formed the end of the bed, and thus a one legged
bedstead is complete. Cross pieces are laid across the bedrails.
The bedtick is filled with leaves or grass and the bed is finished.
And here has been found as refreshing rest and sweet dreams as ever
came to royal palaces.
Another thing about the one
legged bedstead was the fact that this bed was not rolled about the
floor so they could sweep, but was stationary. And one of the
earliest purchases of the family was a few yards of bright calico
(and only the wealthiest could afford it) to make a “valence” to run
around the bed from wall to wall. In those days flooring was either
hewn from puncheons or planks from the whip saw, an therefore, the
space under the bed being hidden from sight was left without any
floor at all. But the one legged bedstead passed away. No one can
tell exactly when or how but none has been in this country for years
and years. I was in some way succeeded by the trundle bed, the bed
of nearly all our ancestors here. It was simply a bed under a
regular bed. The result of a happy combination was such that every
bed in the county might be said to have a two story one.
The trundle bed, too, has
come and gone. It served its time and purpose especially where
house room was scarce and children aplenty. But its days were
numbered and now for years it is only a memory among older people
and in a short time the coming generation will read this and
conclude that we are only romancing.
A kind of sympathy or
brotherhood existed among the pioneers which has almost faded away
with other landmarks of the early period. When a covered wagon was
spied through the forest, the cry would be “There comes another
settler.” And all would start to meet the newcomer and give him a
hearty welcome. They would take axes and help cut out a trail to
his land and aid him in selecting a site for his cabin. In two or
three days sufficient logs would be cut and his cabin erected. A
hole would be cut in the side for a door and the family housed in
their new home. This was pioneer friendship and hospitality and far
more sincere than it is at the present day.
After the settlers got
established in their new home, they would take the ax, the maul, and
wedge and go to the timber, cut some trees that will split and make
rails enough to fence six or eight acres 7 rails high.
Then they would commence on
their clearing, cutting down trees and piling the brush from morning
until night, day after day until they got the trees all cut down and
the brush piled on the amount of ground they intended to clear.
Then they would cut the
trees into lengths so they could be handled Then before time to
commence plowing they would invite their neighbors, and some of them
lived 10 or 15 miles away, to come at a specified time and they
would pile the logs. That was called a log rolling.
Then after they got the log
heaps burned and the brush piles (they usually burned the brush
piles after night) they would plow the new or stump ground. If the
person who did the plowing had any “cuss words” laid back and hidden
away they will surely come out when his plow hits a stump or gets
fastened under a root, and his horses don’t stop quick enough and a
trace chain or a singletree or the doubletree or perhaps the plow
breaks, then is when the cuss words get used. All of the settlers
who selected homes in the timber had to go through all of this hard
work and a lot more before they got their farms cleared and fenced.
After the plowing was done
they harrowed the ground with the harrow. When the ground was ready
to plant they would make the furrows for planting with a one horse
single shovel plow and drop the corn by hand and cover with a hoe.
Then when the corn was ready to cultivate they would plow with a
single or double shovel plow with one horse. It wasn’t an easy job
plowing corn among stumps, the plow getting fast on stumps or roots
and jerking the plow over or around the stumps. I know for I have
worked in stumpy ground. They would have to go over the field about
two times during the season with an ax or a sprouting hoe and cut
sprouts off the stumps. I wonder what the young farmers today would
do if they had to go into a 5 or 10 acre field of corn among stumps
to cultivate? They should be thankful that the pioneers and their
forefathers got the ground cleared so they can farm the easy way,
all riding tools, and no horses to bother with.
At about this time, or after
the days of buckskin clothing that everyone wore homespun clothing.
The girls like the boys, had no idle hours for there was the carding
of wool by hand into rolls, spinning them on a large wheel, walking
to and fro through the long and weary days, turning the wheel with
one hand and holding the thread with the other. Then the yarn was
reeled into skeins, dyed and washed, the put upon the warping bars
and then into the loom. Each thread of the warp must be through
the “gears,” and through the “reed.” Then the shuttle was thrown
backward and forward and the thread beaten in with the “lathe.”
There was the weaving of
linen for sheets, pillow case, towels, tableclothes and
underclothing of tow and wool, the making of “linsey-woolsey” for
gowns or of all-wool cloth for men’s garments. From early morning
till the fire burned low on the hearth at night mother and daughter
were at work wielding the hand-cards, throwing the shuttle, or
whirling the wheel.
When the carding, spinning,
dyeing and weaving were done, there was still more to do—the making
of quilts, coverlets, and sheets, for no girl could think of being
married till she had a bountiful supply of these things.
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