USA > Iowa > Black Hawk County > History of Black Hawk County, Iowa, and its people, Volume I > Part 14
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Virden also tells of a visit to a big Indian camp at the forks of the Cedar, tivelve miles north of Waterloo, in the fall of 1847. The Indians were feasting and dancing and holding a big pow-wow in preparation to starting out on the warpath for their old-time enemies, the Sioux. They were Winnebagoes, Sacs, Foxes and Pottawattomies, and there were fully one thousand Indians in the camp. Mr. Virden had, the spring before, lost a valuable pony and suspected some of the wandering bands of Indians of taking it. His visit to his camp was to see if he could locate the missing pony. He was unsuccessful. The Indians wel- comed him in a hospitable manner and he partook of their feast with them,
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appreciating it heartily until he learned that one of the principal dishes of which he had eaten was boiled dog.
Hle remembers a band of fugitive Winnebagoes who were fleeing from a war party of Sioux braves who had defeated them in a battle near Shell Rock in 1849. came down the river one night and camped near his cabin. They carried their wounded with them and among the latter was an old man who had been shot through the back and was near death. The Indians started on south the next morning but they had only got to Miller's Creek when the old warrior died. They made a grave for him there and Mr. Virden thinks the Cicero Close house was built in later years directly over the mound. The Indian graves were then made by the placing of the body in a sitting position on the ground with a blanket around it and the warrior's gun crossing the knees. Around the body a small palisade of hickory slabs was built to protect it from the beasts of the forest and then dirt was thrown over it until the body was covered and a large mound raised. Mr. Virden says he and Charles Mullan found one other grave of an Indian in Poyner Township buried in this manner and that they removed some of the palisade slats and saw the skeleton, the decayed gun stock and red blanket of the red man. This grave was near where Benjamin Winsett's cabin was later built. Two more Indian graves were located in what is now Cedar River Park, north and cast of where the amphitheatre is located. An Indian child, which died one winter, was lashed in a blanket to a limb of a tree and hung there for several years. This was on the bank of Dobson's Lake, northwest of this city.
In speaking of the scarcity of game here now, Mr. Virden recalled that this scarcity was not noticeable during the early years of his residence here. He re- members when he stood on the main street in Cedar Falls and shot wild turkeys in a jack oak thicket nearby. The game seasons of 1846 and 1847 were remark- able, especially for deer and wild turkeys, but during the winter of 1856 the Indians slaughtered the deer in great number and they were scarce ever after that. The wild turkey was plentiful for some time and furnished rare sport.
These are but incidents in the life of Mr. Virden in the then new country. They are interesting to a certain extent because none of them have ever been published.
Mr. Oscar Virden, a brother, who resided at Virden's Grove in Waterloo Township, also has spoken about how the Indians each year would set forest fires which would go roaring, devouring everything in their way across the prairie and through the timber.
He told many interesting incidents of visits by Indians. They were always peaceable and always quiet except when they happened to go to Cedar Falls and somebody there would sell them whiskey. "It was not unusual," said Mr. Virden, "to have one or more big Indians visit our cabin each week. They would come and beg corn or food. My wife and I would always invite them in the house and be as friendly to them as we could because we did not want to arouse their dis- pleasure in any way. One afternoon a big buck came came to the cabin door and knocked. It was a cold, wintry day and the Indian carried a gun slung across his shoulder. He told us that he had been on a hunting trip. He could not talk English very plainly, but managed to tell us that he would like to come in and get warm, also stay all night. I took his gun and hung it up in the cabin and my wife hurried about to get supper ready. The Indian brought his appetite
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with him and after eating most everything there was in sight he shoved back from the table, sat a few moments, then arose and said, 'Me eat, then Puckachee (go away).' I got his gun and he thanked us and was off in the night. He rejoined his companions who were camping about two miles southwest of us."
Mr. and Mrs. Oscar Virden recounted many other interesting incidents con- cerning the visits of Indians to their cabin or of their presence in the neighbor- hood. While about thirty or forty redskins were camping or trapping along the Black Hawk, they decided to take their furs, of which they had secured a large quantity, to Cedar Falls to sell. At that time somebody at the Falls was willing, it seemed, to sell whiskey to the Indians and judging from their hilarity and queer capers they were cutting, Mr. Virden said they evidently had had an excellent time. When they returned to camp they had a terrible pow-wow and their yells split the air and went resounding over a goodly section of Black Hawk County. One of the braves, who was pretty tipsy, came to the Virden cabin and made his wants known in the following language : "Me want ten corns (ten ears of corn) to feed pony on. Me Iowa chief."
"It seems to me," replied Mr. Virden, "that you are riding a pretty poor pony for an Iowa chief." At this the Indian grunted and tried to smile, but he couldn't make it out very well. Virden gave him the corn and he galloped away in the direction of the rest of his tribe. Next morning Mr. Virden went over the same route and found the corn strung all along the way and he said he didn't believe that the Iowa chief had a single ear when he reached camp.
Oscar Virden was born in Kentucky but was living in Illinois when he was married to Miss Love Charity Powell, a native of Massachusetts, February 12, 1846. The couple came here about five years after their marriage and passed through all the experiences of a couple who go to form a new home in a new land.
PIONEER DAYS IN THE COUNTY
The following interesting article is by Elizabeth Fancher, an early comer to Waterloo. Her husband was the first storekeeper here. Mrs. Fancher is now a resident of River Forest, Illinois.
My father, William Virden, was a pioneer of Illinois as well as Iowa. He moved from Lexington, Kentucky, to Illinois in 1825 and bought a farm in Wayne County, where he lived twenty-five years, then sold it and moved to Black Hawk County, Iowa, in the spring of 1851.
We were on the road five weeks and traveled 500 iniles to reach this Land of Promise.
For the last three weeks of our journey, we had rainy weather and when- ever there was a half day of sunshine, we stopped, dried and aired our bedding and cleaned house, for our prairie schooner houses would get out of order.
The roads had been muddy and bad, the streams swollen and bridges washed out, causing much delay. But at last we reached the Mississippi River and crossed on a ferry boat at Rock Island. Now our spirits rose. We expected less rain and better roads. We did find less mud, for Iowa soil was sandy and the water soaked away. We were, however, soon confronted with new difficulties-the Iowa sloughs, where water stood in places and the rest of the ground miry and swampy. When we came to these sloughs, we had to double teams and take one
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wagon through at a time. Sometimes the wagons would sink down almost to the hubs and it required the united strength of two yoke of oxen and a team of horses in front to get over these places, spending perhaps a half day's time. Those same sloughs have all been dyked and drained and are under cultivation, and travelers speeding over the good roads of lowa have little idea of the annoyance and delays to which the early settlers were subjected.
But it is not of the journey I wish to tell, for that would make a chapter itself. but rather of our journey's end. for I know we were all glad enough this overland trip was finished.
PARTY REACHES FUTURE WATERLOO
My brother James sighted our canvas covered wagon three miles away and came to meet us, and in a little while after, on that first day of July, our caravan of four wagons, a buggy, five horses, three yoke of oxen, halted in front of his log cabin, which stood on the east bank of Cedar River. Waterloo, the place then being called Prairie Rapids Crossing.
This was my father's destination also, where he laid two land warrants of forty acres and an adjoining claim of forty acres.
James' wife gave us a warm welcome and soon had a good dinner ready. We had eaten picnic fashion so long we hardly knew how to conduct ourselves at a table.
My two brothers had a log house up for us, with roof and floor, but it took two weeks longer to build the chimney and a fireplace to cook by, to hang the doors and put glass in the windows. When it was ready, we unloaded our wagons and brother Oscar and family, who had moved with us, stayed with us until he could build his house.
Oscar settled on Black Hawk Creek, four miles south, near my brothers, William and John Virden. William had moved hither in the spring of 1845 with his brother-in-law, George Washington Hanna. It may be interesting to note that Wash Hanna's son, Phillip Hanna, consul general to Mexico, was recently humili- ated by the Mexican Federals and put in prison for two days when he was re- leased by the Constitutionalists on April 22d on this year. 1914.
FAMILIES ARE REUNITED
My sister, America, with her husband, Charles Mullan, and my brother James, moved to Iowa in 1846. My brother John came with his family in 1849. So that all my father's large family except one married sister. Martha Bunting, living in Illinois, were now settled in Black Hawk County. Iowa. Like a flock of sheep, when one goes through the gap the rest follow.
Brother James' log house was the first one built on the east side of the river, and my father's the second one, about two hundred yards distant. Our log house was built on a creek bank that afterward bore the name Virden Creek.
I remember the first day of July, when we arrived, that the garden stuff was just coming up, the first planting having been overflowed by high water.
Mother thought it a poor looking place, for when we left home in Southern Illinois, the 25th day of May, we were through with our early garden stuff, cur- rants and gooseberries were ripe, and cherries turning.
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The next day after our arrival my brother-in-law, Charles Mullan, crossed the river in an Indian canoe to give us welcome greetings. He told us of the family and how anxious my sister was to see us all, but it was dangerous crossing, for the river was high that spring and the water spread out over the low ground on the west side, covering acres of it.
I wanted to see my sister and the children and begged him to take me home with him. He said if I would do just as he told me to, he could take me over safely .. I was to lie flat on my back in the canoe and not stir hand nor foot. I promised and, although Mr. Mullan said it was rather risky and the family protested, we started down the path through the high grass to the river bank. I lay down in the canoe, put my arms straight down by my sides, shut my eyes and he pushed out into the river. The even strokes of the paddle and the swish of the water were like a lullaby. The river was about half a mile wide where we crossed.
We landed safely about one hundred yards west of their log cabin. My sister saw us coming and was there to meet us, and we had a happy reunion after six years of separation, walking arm in arm up the hill to the little cabin. I found four dear children, instead of the two I had kissed goodby, who are still living in Waterloo, namely, Mrs. Elizabeth Davison and Judge Charles Mullan.
HARDSHIPS ENDURED BY MULLANS
I stayed several days and we had a happy visit together, talking of her old friends and neighbors she had left in Illinois and of her experiences in Iowa, the first winter being an exceptionally hard one. In the dead of winter, their flour and provisions got so low her husband had to go to Marion, Linn County, their nearest trading post, and also nearest postoffice, sixty miles distant.
He made the trip through deep snow and almost a trackless territory, subject to many dangers as were the little family left behind surrounded by Indians. Some nights she kept guard over the babies with a loaded rifle in reach. During the three lonely weeks of her husband's absence she lived almost entirely on hulled corn.
Mr. Mullan was a surveyor and away from home a good deal. Once when he was gone an Indian came into the cabin and wanted to buy Lizzie, her baby, the little white papoose, and poured out gold pieces from a buckskin bag, stalking away quite sullenly when she would not sell her. Another time, an Indian reached the cabin about dark and would not leave. So America gave him a blanket and let him sleep in a corner of the cabin. He got up in the night to stir the fire, but she pointed the gun at him and made him lie down. The next morning he made her understand he had toothache, asked for some red pepper pods, which he boiled, and then drank the water. He left after breakfast, saying she was a brave squaw.
Mr. Mullan was made postmaster when the first mail route in 1852 was estab- lished, and America used an old teapot for the mail box, placing it near the door, where the patrons could step in and get their own letters.
During those few days we visited together after our long separation, America said : "With all the hardships we have gone through, I am not sorry we came to this place. It will be the Garden of Eden some day." She looked out over the
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rolling prairie and prophesied it would all be settled up in a few years, and her vision came true.
MARKETS WERE FAR DISTANT
At the time we reached lowa, there were few settlers and everything was exceedingly primitive, with many hardships and privations to endure.
We had to go twenty-five miles to mill and father went to Dubuque, 100 miles distant, for some groceries, a cook stove, nails and other hardware to finish the house.
There were no churches nor schools until in '53 the first log schoolhouse was built, serving for a church as well. It was used alternately by Methodists. Presby- terians and Baptists. Mr. S. W. Ingham often preached for the Methodists.
Indians frequently camped in the woods and skimmed the river in their canoes. They were friendly but troublesome.
Deer and wild turkey were plentiful and the prairies fairly swarmed with prairie chickens, grouse and quails. There were still some buffaloes and elk roaming the country. Along the rivers and creeks, beavers, mink and otters were numerous and muskrat towns built up in every sloughy place.
In the woods, wolves, lynx and wild cats held the fort. One day my brother William's wife shot a wild cat in the act of springing on her baby girl at play just outside the door of their cabin.
Coyotes made the nights dismal with their weird, everlasting barking and howl- ing and though not dangerous, they boldly carried off young pigs and raided hen houses. My brother Tom stood in the kitchen door one morning and shot one eat- ing a Sunday chicken dinner by the henhouse.
The first year in Iowa, mother was very homesick for the old home she had left in Illinois with its orchard, garden and flowers and peach trees growing in every fence corner.
Father took a different view of things and was very hopeful. My four single brothers, a niece and myself thoroughly enjoyed this wild new country.
Mother could not get used to the Iowa winds. She would say: "Oh these winds! They blow, blow, night and day and never cease!" which was truc. It was almost impossible to hang out a washing in the winter time. The winds whipped the clothes to pieces and would clip off the corners of the sheets as smooth as if a knife had cut them. The men would laugh and declare that all they had to do to get shaved was to walk around the corner of the house and meet a sharp north wind.
ENTERTAINED MANY TRAVELERS
A year or two later, a great many people were coming to Iowa and almost every day movers passed our house, which was about half way between Cedar Falls and Poyner's Creek, a stretch of twelve miles between. Although our house was none too large for our own family, we were often obliged to share it with the weary travelers, giving them food and shelter.
Now as I recall those times, the capacity of our rude log cabin was im- mense and no hospitality more cordial and sincere than that of the pioneers of
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Iowa. All travelers had to say was: "Can I stay all night here?" and the family would share their food and beds and the expression "Our latch string always hangs out" was literally true.
But those prairie schooners brought to the country the men and women who laid deep and lasting foundations of the great State of Iowa.
I love to hark back to the long ago pioneer days. In memory, I see the vast stretches of treeless prairies, its rolling waves as the wind rippled the high grass. Not a house was in sight for at that time houses were built in the edge of the woods, as prairie fires and winter blizzards were a menace to life. So those prairies for many years were left a wilderness of natural beauty, the home of the wild rose and prairie velvets, but now they are all under cultivation. Everywhere are fine prosperous farms, churches, schoolhouses, orchards, groves and fine roads leading to pretty towns while autos race over the highways over which in early days the ox teams crawled at snail's pace.
But what of the brave old pioneer who took the brunt of the battle, suffered and built ? All gone. Scarcely one left to tell the tale.
FIRST WINTER IN IOWA
I remember our first winter in Iowa the snow fell the 10th day of November and we saw no more bare ground that winter. The river froze two to three feet deep, making a safe crossing, good sleighing and enjoyable skating for the young people.
My brothers would take their spears, go down the river, cut holes in the ice and spear a sled load of fish, large pike and pickerel; bring them home, throw them in a shed where they would freeze solid, but when put into a tub of boiling water would flop out alive; so to make sure they were dead we would chop off their heads. I got so tired of fish that winter I have never liked them since.
That fall we became acquainted with many of the people at the Big Woods, twelve miles away to the north, and we visited back and forth, riding through the deep snow with cheerful spirits despite the cold, for in those early times people who lived two or three miles away were neighbors and others living twenty miles away were still neighbors. I recall the Barricks, the Pattees, Pains, the Goforthis, who were good singers the Moores, Fairbrothers and many others.
In the spring of '52 we opened up a sugar maple camp down in the woods three miles away. We were there about three weeks making sugar and syrup and had 300 pounds of sugar and a barrel of syrup. The first few runs of sap make light colored sugar. By the second week the sugar is a darker grade and the last runs make the syrup. We had enough sugar and syrup to last a year and the syrup was delicious on our buckwheat cakes. It was great fun for us young folks to camp out, though there was hard work to be done in carrying sap and attending to the boiling and sugaring off. We cooked most of our provisions at home. We often caught sight of deer in camp and the boys would shoot squirrels for pot luck.
ATTACKS OF FEVER AND AGUE
In the summer of '52 nearly all the family took the ague ; sometimes three or four would be in bed shaking at one time. Then, after the shake, a raging fever
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came on and how miserable we felt and how we were dosed with quinine. It came fall of the year with fall work to do; cutting wild prairie grass for hay, gath- ering corn and digging potatoes. I never saw such a big crop of potatoes as grew that summer on the sod land broken the year before and now they must be dug. The soil was dry and sandy and they rolled out of the ground almost as clean as if they had been washed. My brother, Tom, would go out in the morning and dig until the chill came on, then give it up. At last he grew out of patience and said : "Well, tomorrow, I'm going to work all day if it kills me." So the next day he was up early and out at work in the potato patch and he did work all day long, hardly taking time to eat a bite. I don't see how he stood it but he dug and perspired, till his clothes hung dripping wet to him by night. Then he took a bath, went to bed and arose the next morning feeling fine and that was the last of the "shakes." He had perspired the malaria out of his system apparently. These chills and fevers were very discouraging to the early settlers with all the other drawbacks, but we never lost faith in Iowa's future greatness.
Brother Tom and I are the only surviving members of our large family. He is living in Whitewater, Colorado, where he is a great favorite and recently cele- brated his eighty-third birthday, about fifty of his friends gathering in to spend the day with him as has been their custom for many years.
FIRST FOURTH OF JULY CELEBRATION
By the spring of '53, several families had built log cabins on the west side of the river and four or five families settled north of us on the prairie-Mr. Mason Hale, Elijah Balcom, Zimri Streeter and Samuel Aldrich ; so we began to feel we were quite a large community and were in cheerful mood.
The earth and air smelled of spring time, the skies were growing bright and it was good to be out of doors in the sunshine after a long cold winter had blown over. Already we were dreaming of summer plans.
Why not have a Fourth of July celebration this year, a real Fourth? So the question was agitated pro and con. We certainly had not lost our patriotism liv- ing in this new country.
My father had served through the War of 1812; Mr. Hale had served in the same war as drummer boy. Mr. Balcom played the flute. Here was our martial music. Several young people volunteered to sing in the choir, namely to stand on the platform and join in the singing: "My Country 'Tis of Thee" and "The Star Spangled Banner." Mothers and daughters were to do a good deal of their excellent baking ; every one to help and every one a self-appointed committee. So the plans and work went steadily on without a hitch or break in the whole program.
I remember the morning of the Fourth, the sun rose clear and bright and at break of day, Mr. Hunter, a merchant of Janesville, who stayed over night at our house, wakened us all by singing the "Star Spangled Banner" at the top of his voice out in the yard and the refrain : "Oh, say can you see by the dawn's early light," routed us all out.
After breakfast, father and the boys killed and dressed a pig, which was roasted whole in the oven, besides roasted chickens, vegetables, pies and cakes. Mother had half a dozen loaves of bread ready to bake for the dinner. As every-
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SECTIONAL VIEW OF WATERLOO SHOWING LOG STORE BUILDING ERECTED IN 1853 AT CORNER OF PARK AVENUE AND COMMERCIAL STREET
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one was expected to be on the ground at 10 o'clock sharp people were hurry- ing about early.
About 8 o'clock Mr. Hale and Mr. Balcom passed along with their music, going to the grounds where the people were to march around on the prairie grass to the strains of the fife and drum.
The place selected was on the east side of the river near where the river was usually forded as well as I can remember the spot, for there were no streets at that time, just prairie grass and gopher holes. A little platform was made and covered over with boughs.
By 10 o'clock ox wagons were driving up loaded with people, chairs, tables and provisions. We took a wagon load of things to the grounds.
The parade began, men, boys and women marching along the banks of the river, making the woods ring with music and singing. After circling around the plat- form the musicians and speakers went up and took their seats.
Charles Mullan was marshall of the day and G. W. Hanna, chaplain. My brother John read the Declaration of Independence. John Brooks gave the oration. Some young people led in the singing and at intervals the band played. Most of the audience sat on the grass but a few had brought chairs in their wagons.
During the exercises on the platform some of the women were busy getting the dinner on the table. A fire of driftwood was made to boil potatoes and coffee. The men helped with the work as much as the women.
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