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LINCOLN COUNTY, KANSAS A Souvenir History THE MOFFIT BOYS Pages 18 - 20 In spite of the fact that the country up the Saline River was not considered safe, a settlement was attempted in 1864 which ended disastrously. In March six persons, Charlie Chase, William Chase, Marion Chase, and John Moffit, Flave Moody and an unknown party, who wrote the story for the "Salina Journal," started westward from their camp near where the Saline bridge now stands, to start a settlement on Spillman Creek. They halted and pitched their camp between Beaver Creek and the Saline River, in the second bend below the mouth of the Beaver. This camp was blown up by the explosion of a keg of powder. The boys then built a log-house and stable. Charles Chase and John Moffit went to Salina for provisions. During their absence the rest of the party had to live on parched corn. After three days of this exclusive cereal diet Flave Moody and Marion Chase started to walk east and the other two stayed by the goods. When the provisions arrived they baked biscuits and bachelor-like forgot to put either soda or baking powder in them. The next move was to buy three cows. They had four horses and one yoke of oxen. Although they had not filed on land they fenced in and planted twenty acres of corn. About the last of May they were driven off by an Indian outbreak. They all arrived in safety at their former camp near the Saline bridge. About July 1, against all protests, John Moffit and his brother Thomas, with a Mr. Hueston and Mr. Taylor, came back to the ranch. In August, while out on a buffalo hunt, they were surprised by the Indians. Settlers who lived about Salina fail to agree in regard to the particulars of this incident. The following is a part of an official report to the Government from the headquarters of the Eleventh Volunteer Cavalry at Salina by Capt. Henry Booth, of Company L.: "Saturday evening, August 6, 1S64, four men, two men (brothers) Moffit, one Taylor, and one Heuston, started from their ranch to kill a buffalo for meat, taking a two-horse team with them. Upon reaching the top of the hill about three-quarters of a mile from the house, the Indians were discovered rushing down upon them. The horses were turned and run toward a ledge of rock where the men took position. They appear to have fought desperately and must have killed several Indians, but one of the scalps was left on a rock close by. The horses were both shot through the head. This was probably done by the ranchmen to prevent them from falling into the hands of the Indians. The wagon was burned. The Indians made a descent. upon the house in which were an old man and a woman. The man shot one of the Indians through a hole in the wall whereupon they all fled. They judge the number of the Indians to be about one hundred. The Indians retreated up the Saline River." There is a letter written to Robert Nichol Moffit, of Illinois, by his brother John, dated May 13, 1864, which says: "We came here March 16. We are twenty-five to thirty miles from Salina up the Saline River. We are now thirteen miles from the nearest house. We put up a stable thirty-five feet in length and a house twenty-two feet of logs." This ought to prove that the Moffit boys really had a house and not merely a dugout. The writer to whom we are indebted for the account of the trip in the early spring, says they built a log house and stable. He also says that the woman m the house was Mrs. Hueston, and that she had her two children with her at the time. They stayed all night in the house, and all the next day watched for Indians. The second night they dug a hole under the back of the house and escaped without coming out at the door. They wandered all night on the Elkhorn and the next morning found their way to the settlements. A party of twelve men went to look for the bodies and found them in the place described. There was sixteen arrows m Jonn Moffit and fourteen in Tom. The bodies were temporarily Dtiried on the scene of the battle. The place of the tragedy is described as being the rocky ledge upon the northeast quarter section nine, township twelve, range seven in Elkhorn township of what is now Lincoln County. Robert Nichol Moffit came from Illinois to recover the remains of his two brothers. He is said to have left Salina September 20, with an escort of soldiers and gone up the Saline to where his brothers were buried, to have disinterred the remains and taken them to Wetherfield, Ill., where they were laid to rest. The first permanent abode of white men was built in the bend of the river, not far from where Beverly now stands, by the Colorado boys. The "Colorado boys" belonged to the First Colorado Cavalry, and while stopping at Salina in 1865 came up the Saline and filed on nearly all the river lands from the mouth of the Beaver, east to where the county line now is. Six of them returned between Christmas and New Years the same year, with government cattle to occupy their claims. They were Richard B. Clark, of Indiana, who is now the only survivor, and still lives at Beverly; Jas. M. Adams, of the British Isles, Isaac De Graff, of New York, nicknamed General De Graff on account of his good judgment, Edward E. Johnson, of Massachusetts, Wm. E. Thompson, of Maine, who had been educated for a Catholic priest, and who was killed by Indians in the Black Hills in 1876, and Darius C. Skinner, of Ohio, whose family is prominent in Lincoln County. These men had crossed the plains prior to the war, and had been in turn miners, and soldiers until they got tired and settled down. They lived in the one dugout for mutual protection until it was safe for each one to live on his claim. The next spring a number of settlers were added to this nucleus. As many names as could be collected are here given without any attempt at giving the order of their coming. Geo. Green and wife, of Massachusetts, whose daughter Lizzie, born October 18, 1866, was the first white child born in this county. She married David Parker. W. T. Wild, of England, and John Dart, of Connecticut, with their families, J. J. Peate, Wm. Gaskill, the Haleys, M. D. Green, Michael Ziegler, John S. Strange, Washington Smith, Martin Hendrickson, David G. Bacon, Volney Ball, J. C Parks, Thomas Moon, Chalmer Smith, Marseilles Smith, Caning Smith, Nicholas Whalen, Thomas E. Skinner and wife, Mary M. Skinner. These people all came in 1866. It has been impossible to find out ail the people who came the next year, but Louis Farley Andrew, DeGraff, and Ferdinand Erhardt, M. S. Green were among the number. The first year the settlers had to buy all their provisions at the following rates: Sugar, 18 to 20 cents per pound; coffee, 50 cents per pound: bacon, 25 to 30 cents per pound; flour, $7.00 to $11.00 per hundredweight; corn, $1.00 to $2.00 per bushel. They killed buffalo and other game for meat, and might have lived pretty high for pioneers if it had not been for the difficulty of getting these provisions to the settlements. One party would go east after bread-stuffs and other necessities, while another would go west after meat. Sometimes these expeditions were delayed on account of the weather and the people ran out of bread. At such times they would supplement their diet of prairie chicken or fish with their precious seed corn. This corn was often ground in a coffee mill or prepared in an old fashioned hominy mortar. This was made of a log about three feet long stood on end, and a hole hewed in the top to hold the corn. A wedge was fastened in the end of a stick about the size of a pick handle. The corn was cracked with this wedge. The finest was used for bread and the coarse for hominy. The old fashioned whip saw was used to saw the first lumber. A scaffold was built and the logs rolled on it. One man stood on top to pull the saw up and one stood under to pull it down. But in spite of these things the lot of the pioneer in this section of the country was not so hard and his sufferings were not so severe as in many of the earlier communities of the State. It is true that they were in danger of Indian raids and were often driven from their homes, but they never faced actual starvation, and there are no records of anyone dying from want. They got their mail with comparative frequency and were obliged to haul provisions only forty miles instead of from a hundred to two hundred as some other communities did. And above all this section offered its adopted children plenty of wholesome water, pure air and a healthful climate generally. Sometimes money was earned by hauling buffalo bones to market or by killing wolves and buffalo for their hides. F. A. Schemerhorn has the honor of being the first bone-picker. Several other honors are due this gentleman, which will be spoken of as occasion permits. The first postomce was at his ranch. Among the tribes of the plains the medicine man has always been next in importance to the chief. He is usually the best educated man in the tribe and his wisdom is consulted on all occasions, not only in things pertaining to his profession, but in affairs of war and diplomacy. In our civilized life the medical man (who is often a woman). is even more important. He is a specialist and has his work down to a fine point. He plays such worthy role m the affairs of men that no history can leave him out of account. No story of the human race is complete without giving due credit to those who help us in and out of the world-these toll collectors who stand at both the front and the back doors of life. It is all right for one who is not sick to joke about the doctor, for he that is well needeth not a physician; but anyone who is suffering wants a doctor at once, and there is no greater blessing to a community^ than a sufficient number of physicians, who understand their business. There is hardly a person who gives up more personal pleasure and works harder in his profession. The pioneer doctor in Lincoln Center was Dr. Vernon. Dr. Gilpin came soon afterwards. Dr. Sarah Goff was the pioneer lady doctor. She began practicing in Lincoln in 1885 and was successful from the start. Her medical instruction began under Dr. Holloway, of Lincoln, and in 1886 she graduated from Hanneman Medical College of Chicago. Is the oldest practic-ioner in Lincoln at present. He was born near London, England, in 1835, and came with the family to Illinois the next year and lived in Toulson. His education was received in the schools of Illinois and the Knox Seminary in Galesburg. He graduated from the medical department of the Iowa University, receiving his degree in 1858. After practicing medicine in Stark County, Illinois, for a number of years he entered the Chicago Medical College, which is now the medical department of the Northwestern University, and graduated in 1881. He came to Lincoln in 1885 and has practiced here ever since. Ten years ago he went into the drug business in connection with his practice. Doctor Hall was made a Mason in
1862 and is now one of the DR. JAMES LOUGHRIDGE Page 25 Dr. James Loughridge was born and raised in Appanoose County, Iowa. He received his common school education
in a little school house with a red door. He went to Amity College, at College Springs, Iowa. His medical education
was in the University Medical College, at Kansas City, Mo., where he took his degree in 1889. He has had a great
deal of hos pital and clinical work. This remarkable man was born in Sweden, in the Province of Osterysthland, city of Lindkoping. His early education was in the government schools of his native city. He attended college at the University of Upsala, and studied medicine first at the Karolinska Medicuska institution in Stockholm, later at the University of Heidelberg in Germany, spending five years in the study of medicine in these two schools. Doctor Hultner practiced medicine first in Spanish Honduros in the city of Puerto Cortez, in the year 1893. The next year he was registered to practice medicine in Iowa. The next year he came to Kansas and practiced at Wellsford. In 1896 he attended the University Medical College at Kansas City and took his degree. In 1897 there was a private hospital of considerable size at Lawrence owned by Bunn & Hultner, in which
our friend was a full partner. The youngest member of the medical fraternity in Lincoln, is a home product. He was born here and received his common and high school education in the home schools. He attended the Uni-versity. Medical College in Kansas City, Mo., and while in Kansas City he had considerable hospital work. He was eight months at the University Hospital, at the City Hospital two years, and has a diploma from that institution. He was an Inturn for several months. For four months he was on the police ambulance staff. Last May he graduated and came to Lincoln to practice. has been busy ever since. Dr. Sarah A. Cole is the second lady physician to locate in Lincoln County, and the only practitioner of the
Homeopathic school in Lincoln. In 1898 she went 10 the Hanneman Medical College in Chicago, took a full year's course and graduated. Having friends in Lincoln, she decided to locate here. Eight years ago Doctor Cole began building a sanitarium for the accommodation of emergency cases. At the present time it has a capacity of ten patients with hospital facilities and all modern improvements. A new bath house annex is nearly completed. It will contain the apparatus for all kinds of water, electric, vapor, and sun baths. Miss Hannah R. Cole is a sister of Doctor Cole. She is the trained nurse of the sanitarium, and also gives Osteopathic massage. |
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