The September 2016 meeting of the Madison County Genealogical Society was held at the Edwardsville Public Library on Thursday, September 8, at 7:00 pm.
President, Robert Ridenour, called the meeting to order.
The following is the Treasurer's report for the month of August:
Do you have a family member that
is interested in (or even obsessed with) genealogy? A membership
in the Madison County Genealogical Society would be a very thoughtful
gift. A gift card will be sent to the recipient of any gift membership.
The following memberships are available:
Individual/Family Annual Membership $20.00
Patron Annual Membership $30.00
Life Membership $250.00
Contact our Secretary, Petie Hunter, at [email protected],
about a gift membership.
On August 8, 2016, Lola DeGroff presented What to Load in Your Covered Wagon. Lola DeGroff retired from the Department of Defense following more than 20 years of government service. She is the Vice Regent of the Illinois DAR, member of and past Regent of the Silver Creek DAR Chapter, past State President of the Illinois Society US Daughters of 1812, treasurer of the Shawnee Chapter Colonial Dames of the XVII Century, and a member of several other lineage organizations.
Like many of you, our family took
a trip this summer. Before leaving, we checked maps so we knew
which roads to take; packed our clothes; and loaded the suitcase
and a cooler with snacks in our car. Of course, friends and family
had our cell phone number to call in case of an emergency.
This is certainly a far cry from tasks faced by families taking
an adventure west in the 1800s. At that time the primary communication
was the federal mail a slow, unpredictable service.
Yet, in one of the greatest migrations of modern times, spurred
on by a prolonged depression in our country, an estimated 500,000
people migrated west between 1841 and 1866. They traveled to claim
free land in the Oregon and California Territories, many hoping
to strike it rich by mining gold and silver.
Those pioneers came from Illinois, Iowa, Indiana, Missouri, and
as far away as New York and New Hampshire. Moving itself wasn't
new to them; many had moved before as had their parents and grandparents
before them.
Guidebooks, such as "Emigrants Guide to Oregon and California
in 1845," promised the adventure would take three to four
months. Mostly these guidebooks were wrong. Most trips took six
to eight months.
The "jumping off" place to the west lay in towns along
the Missouri River between St. Joseph and Council Bluffs. Emigrants
began arriving in late March so that when the snows had melted
in early April, they were ready to go. Others wintered in these
then small towns, gathering their supplies, preparing their wagons,
or waiting for families or friends to join them.
Can you imagine what it took to get ready for such a journey?
Of course we need to remember, in those days people made nearly
everything themselves. In her diary, Keturah Belknap described
making the linen for a wagon cover and sacks for supplies. ".
. . will spin mostly evenings while my husband reads to me. The
little wheel in the corner don't make any noise. I spin for Mother
B. and Mrs. Hawley and they will weave."
Thanks to detailed letters, journals, and diaries such as Keturah's,
we learn a lot about those journeys.
First, the overland wagon was built of seasoned hardwood. During
the trip, as the pioneers discovered, the wagon would have to
withstand extreme variations in temperature. Typically the travelers
used a farm wagon with a flat bed about 10 feet wide and 15 feet
long, with sides two feet high.
Benjamin Bonney recalled his father worked for months building
a wagon sturdy enough for river crossings and mountain travel.
Since the wagon could be loaded with up to twenty-five hundred
pounds it required four to six yoke of oxen to pull it. The family
cow went along too.
Built to be amphibious, the wagon had a tar bucket hanging from
the side and the covering was a double thickness of canvas, made
as rainproof as oiled linen, muslin or sailcloth could be. Since
parts could break, spare parts were kept under the wagon beds.
So now that the wagon was constructed, what should be packed inside?
Well, our resource, "The Emigrants Guide," recommended
that each emigrant have 200 pounds of flour, 150 pounds of bacon,
10 pounds of coffee, 20 pounds of sugar, and 10 pounds of salt.
Plus they should have corn meal, chipped beef, rice, tea, dried
beans and fruit, saleratus (baking soda), vinegar, pickles, mustard,
tallow, rifles, and a supply of gunpowder and lead. And oh by
the way, don't forget some cash to pay the ferryman at the river
crossings and some trinkets to trade with the Indians.
Female pioneers sewed pockets along the sides of the wagon canvas
to hold their most important things: a Bible, quinine, citric
acid, matches in a jar with a tight fitting lid, and some small
toys to keep the children occupied. Keturah's young son, Jessie,
had some marbles and sticks and blocks he used as oxen. He used
his mother's workbasket as a covered wagon and played "Going
to Oregon."
Many women's diaries describe using home remedies during their
travels, and many carried quinine for malaria, hartshorn for snakebites,
citric acid for scurvy, as well as whiskey for everything else.
These remedies were tested frequently on their long voyage injuries,
cholera, mountain fever, dysentery, falls from wagons, childbirth
these are but a few of the problems confronted.
How did the people making this enormous trip feel in anticipating
their journey? Many were optimists who focused on the opportunities
that lie ahead. Others, such as the mother of nine-year-old Barnet
Simpson, were pessimists. She prepared burial shrouds for each
member of the family before departing for Oregon. Some men also
shared this fatalist spirit, taking along boards specially cut
for making coffins.
Unfortunately the journals are filled with reports of loved ones
dying and being buried along the trail. In his classic book, "The
Great Plains," Walter Prescott Webb told of a report estimating
that each mile of the 2,000 mile journey cost seventeen lives.
Some of the main problems that faced the pioneers were finding
feed and water both for the cattle and for themselves. Often the
water found was not useable and many humans and animals got sick
or died from drinking it. When the food was gone, the mountain
passes closed by snow, many emigrants left many of their belongings
behind and packed necessities on mules in a desperate attempt
to reach the end of their journey.
Let's look for a moment at a typical day for a female pioneer.
She did the usual domestic chores: prepared the meals, washed
the clothes, cared for the children, milked the cows. But she
also drove the ox teams, collected buffalo chips for fuel, and,
if the river waters were high, everything inside the wagons sometimes
all two thousand pounds of supplies and possessions had to be
unloaded, placed on rafts, and repacked again on the other side.
Lodisa Frizzell said, "All our work here requires stooping;
not having tables, chairs, or anything it is very hard on the
back."
One pioneer recalled that the evening's milking was used for supper,
but that milked in the morning was put into a high tin churn and
the constant jostling formed butter and delicious buttermilk by
night. Another rolled out her pie dough on the wagon seat beside
her while moving multi-tasking indeed.
Greatly outnumbered by the male travelers, female pioneers sought
out other "sisters." They no doubt enjoyed another woman's
company. But from more of a practical side, one or two women with
their long full skirts gave privacy to another during childbirth
or just to relieve herself travelling the treeless, flat plains
with so many men.
In a letter to her sister, Betsy Bayley recalled a humorous story
although probably not funny at the time. "At Fort Hall,"
she wrote, "the Indians came to our camp and said they wanted
to trade. They wanted to trade horses for wives. Mr Bayley joked
with them, and asked a young Indian how many horses he would give
for Caroline. The Indian said `three.' Mr Bayley said, `Give me
six horses and you can have her,' all in a joke. The next day
the Indian came after her and had the six horses and seemed determined
to have her. He followed our wagon for several days, and we were
glad to get rid of him without trouble."
Packing up and moving so many miles across the then undeveloped
country required a great deal of courage and sacrifice leaving
family, friends and belongings behind. Because of our nurturing
nature, this was no doubt very hard on the mothers and daughters.
Hopefully you share my admiration for those brave women who risked
so much to settle the western United States.
As you probably know, the Daughters of the American Revolution
(DAR) has recognized the sacrifices and courage of these pioneer
women with Madonna of the Trail monuments in 12 states along the
trail. One is in nearby Vandalia, Illinois.
Consider these words by Emerson
Hough: "The chief figure of the American West, the figure
of the ages, is not the long-haired, fringed-legging man, riding
a raw-boned pony, but the gaunt and sad-faced woman sitting on
the front seat of the wagon, following her lord where he might
lead her, her face hidden in the same ragged sunbonnet which had
crossed the Appalachians and Missouri long before. That was America,
my brethren! There was the seed of America's wealth. There was
the great romance of America the woman in the sunbonnet; and not,
after all, the hero with the rifle across his saddle horn. Who
has written her story? Who has painted her picture?"
A pioneer lawyer at a 4th of July celebration of the Sons and
Daughters of Oregon Pioneers many many years ago, evidently agreed
saying, "I think the time has come when we should give due
credit to the Pilgrim Mothers, for they not only endured all the
hardships of the Pilgrim fathers, but in addition endured the
Pilgrim Fathers besides."
Sources:
* Cassie's Journey: Going West in the 1860s, Brett Harvey
* Covered Wagon Women, Diaries & Letters from the Western
Trails, 1840-1890, Volume I, Kenneth L. Holmes
* Women's Diaries of the Westward Journey, Lillian Schlissel
* Westward Expansion: An Interactive History Adventure, Allison
Lassieur
* What People Wore During the Westward Expansion, Allison Stark
Draper
* Westward to the Pacific: an overview of America's Westward Expansion,
Ray Allen Billington
This presentation was very well received and provoked many questions
and comments.
