USA > Iowa > Jones County > History of Jones County, Iowa, past and present, Volume I > Part 43
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I think a small part of it is still standing. Mr. George at the time was in the gold fields of Australia. Mrs. George's family consisted of herself and four chil- dren, and a bachelor brother. Her children's names were Margaret, Sarah, William and James, Henry being a later addition.
The same year my father entered the land and built a house on the place known as the Gerhard Eiler place. The same house is there today in good shape. My father hauled white oak logs from the timber, and hewed all the joists and sills. He then hauled black walnut and white cak logs to Dale's mill, down the river, and had them sawed into lumber for siding, doors, etc. The black walnut was for doors and casings. The shingles he made himself with a draw knife and shaving horse by hard work. I think it was ready to move into some time in November of the same year. Of course it wasn't plastered, as plastering was not in style in Iowa in those days. It was sheeted and weather boarded, and was about as warm as the ordinary barn is now, but we were all healthy and happy.
Nothing eventful happened that I can think of until the next spring, when the neighbors got together and decided they must have a school. They hauled a small frame house from some abandoned claim, and placed it south of Clark's hotel, which would now be at the corner of Main and 3rd streets, and hired Miss Rosalia Bartholomew to teach a three months' term of school. That was my first school, although I could read quite well. I distinctly remember nearly every pupil by name, and if I were an artist I could draw their pictures. Their names were: Margaret McLean, Mary McLean, Lafayette Selder, John Selder, Robert Selder, Fidelia Selder, Martha Selder, Josephine Lamb, Harvey Lamb, Louisa Varvel, Alexander Varvel, Sarah Varvel (now Mrs. Sleeper), Lucinda Skelley, Lizzie Skelley, James Skelley, Sarah George, William George, Martha Phemister, and Charles Phemister.
These are all I can think of and I feel quite sure all there were. The teacher offered a prize for the pupil that obtained the most head marks during the term. Lizzie Skelley and I had equal numbers, so she gave each of us a book. Mine was Peter Parley's "Winter Evening Tales." I have mine yet, and prize it very much. The first two or three years we had only a three months' school in the summer, but after that we had three months in summer and three in winter. Our second term was taught by Miss Hattie Wright, afterward the first Mrs. D. E. Pond. The third term was taught by Miss Ann Mclaughlin of Castle Grove, lately de- ceased. The teachers all "boarded round" among the patrons of the school. I
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remember when it was our turn to have the teacher. I felt quite distinguished walking to and from school with her.
Occasionally a colporteur or circuit rider would happen along, and when- ever one did, the people at whose house he stopped notified all the neighbors in some way, and by night they all collected together at some one's house, and all had a good time, listening to the preaching, praying and singing, and afterwards visiting, perhaps, over a cup of coffee and something to eat. The preacher was always urged to come again. For a long time Rev. Ira Blanchard came about once in four weeks. He nearly always stopped at Skelley's.
Later on, we had meetings in the schoolhouse. The preacher always gave out that "at early candle lighting the Lord willing, I will preach here again, two weeks from tonight."
Later on Rev. Swerengen came regularly every two weeks. I have seen him come in late, when perhaps we had been waiting an hour or so. He had rid- den several miles over the prairies and was so nearly frozen that he would commence preaching with his overcoat on, and by the time he was through he would have nothing on but his shirt and pants. Some twenty years or so, ago, he preached regularly in the Methodist church at Monticello.
The first person that was buried in the Monticello cemetery was Alexander Faragher, Mrs. Ann George's brother. He died in April, 1852, I don't know the exact date, but know that he died on the Saturday before Easter, and was buried the Monday after. In those days there was no such thing as getting any thing ready-made. The neighbors were all undertakers. My mother and Mrs. Skelley went over and made the burial robe on Easter Sunday (and we were told if we would be good children and stay at home, we could cook all the eggs we wanted. I remember we got the largest kettle there was and filled it full of eggs). Mrs. George's hired man came over to our house to get my father to make the coffin. He had some lumber over head that he was drying to finish the house with in- side. He took it down, and made the coffin. He made it in the house for it was snowing, and there were no outbuildings. Between eating eggs and watch- ing my father work, we put in the long gloomy day without our mother. He didn't get it quite finished during the day, so it had to stand in the middle of the floor over night. I well remember how creepy my brother and I felt when we had to go around it to go to bed. Perry Miller and James Clark dug the grave on Monday (by the way Mrs. George owned the land where the cemetery is. and she said she would bury her brother there, and start a cemetery. She after- wards gave an acre or more to the cemetery association). Everybody in the set- tlement went to the "burying" as it was called at that time. There was no min- ister in miles, so Dr. Selder made a prayer, and they sang some of those old long metered hymns. "Hark from the Tomb a Doleful Sound," or something of that sort. Then we all got onto sleds some drawn by oxen, and some by horses. I remember everybody seemed deeply affected. I think there is a stone on the old George lot yet bearing the name of the deceased.
In the spring of 1852, I think it was, we had very high water, which took away the Maquoketa bridge. There was a great emigration to California that year. The bridge had been pronounced unsafe for some time, but people kept risking it until it fell with a team and two men. The horses I think were killed
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or drowned, but the men escaped with a few bruises and a good ducking. It seemed a miracle as the bridge was a heavy wooden structure and covered. Some one built a rude flat boat and towed the emigrants across. I can't remember who ran the boat. but think it was James Clark and * Perry Miller. They ran the wagons on the boat but generally swam the horses across. Some times it took a whole day to get a crowd of emigrants over. The water got much higher after the bridge fell and came up nearly to the schoolhouse and stayed for some time. We school children had a fine time. Some of the big boys built a skiff, and at noon as many as could get in, went. They would row away out among the trees and sometimes over the tops of the small ones. As I look back now, I wonder that there were any of us left to tell the tale. There must have been a guardian angel always near for in those days we seldom ever had a pair of shoes on from the beginning of warm weather until the frost made it neces- sary, and some were lucky if they got a pair then.
All who lived in that early day will remember how thick the snakes were. I have stepped over many a rattler. They always coiled and rattled before they struck. When he heard a rattle, we made quick steps trying to locate it. We nearly always carried a stick, and seldom ever let one get away. We occasionally knocked a toe nail off on a root or stone or ran a thorn through our foot. We tied up the wound with a piece of fat salt pork and went on with no thought of blood poisoning.
The Skelley and Varvel children, my brother and myself, lived most of the time in and around Kitty creek catching fish, eating wild crabapples, grapes. plums and gooseberries, ripe or green, as they happened to be, all ignorant of the fact that we had an appendix.
We used to get the fever and ague once in a while in summer and our mothers would give us a dose or two of Dr. Jayne's pills, and next day steep up some boneset and dose us a few days, and we were ready for some more grapes and crabapples.
By the way we were here two or three years before I ever saw an apple. This may sound to people, now-a-days, like a hard life, but I doubt if there is a set of children living, anywhere, today, that are enjoying life any better or as well as we did.
The Kitty creek of today is nothing as it was then. It was a beautiful stream, the water was as clear as crystal, with a gravelly bottom of pretty colored stones. It was so clear that you could see to the bottom where it was several feet deep. I felt so disappointed the last time I saw it. The first time I saw it the upper falls had a fall of several feet and the water was churned into a white foam as it fell over the falls. The upper falls are above the bridge; I don't know as the lower falls show at all now.
I think it was in the fall of 1853, that a tragedy occurred in the neighbor- hood. Two young men came along on foot late in the afternoon, and stopped at Varvel's where they asked some impertinent questions. They then passed on to our house. It was drizzling rain and nearly dark. My father was out doing the chores. They called a halt. and asked him how far it was to the Buckhorn tavern. He told them, and then asked them where they were going.
* Died at Langworthy, May 29, 1909.
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They laughed and told him to go to hell. When he came in he said there was something wrong with the fellows who had just passed. He said one of them in particular had a mean look.
We neither thought or heard any more of them until the next night, shortly after dark, when Hugh Bowen, the first settler in the county, and for whom Bowen's Prairie was named, drove up, and hallooed. My father went out and asked, "what is the matter?" He said, "do you want a dead man?" My father answered "no, have you got one?" He said, "he is not quite dead, but I think he soon will be. I picked him up at Stony Creek bridge."
Mr. Bowen had been to Anamosa to mill. They carried the man in, and by the light it was soon apparent what was the matter. He was covered with blood from head to foot, and blood was oozing from the back of his neck. They asked him questions, and he made out to tell his name and the name of the fellow who was with him. When they got the blood washed off my father recognized him as one of the men who passed the evening before.
He sent word to Varvel, and notified all the neighbors, and by midnight he had a company ready to start after the would-be murderer. Daniel Vance was the name of the injured man and the man who shot him was Edward Soper. His parents lived a few miles west of Anamosa. I don't remember who all went on the man hunt, but Dan Varvel was the leader. They went horseback and each one carried a gun, and Varvel took his big dog. Varvel was a native of Kentucky, so you may know he meant business. They arrived at Anamosa some time in the latter part of the night, woke up the officers and got out papers, and the sheriff went with them. I believe they arrived at Soper's just as the old people were getting up. I can imagine they must have been very painfully sur- prised. Varvel headed the posse, and demanded to know where Ed. was. His mother said he was up stairs in bed and that she would call him. Varvel said, "I'll do the calling," and at the same time mounted the stairs. He found Soper just getting out of bed. Varvel told him to dress and do it in a hurry. The ad- jectives they said he used would not look well on paper. He also told him that if he made a move to get away he wouldn't live two minutes. They went back to Anamosa and stopped for breakfast. Then they started for our house with the prisoner, accompanied by all the county officers and nearly all the men of Anamosa. They came in wagons and on horseback, and any way to get there.
Imagine all that crowd coming into a private house that had but two rooms where lay a man at the point of death. By this time Vance could not speak but was conscious. So they pulled the bed out where the men could march around it, and as each man passed by he was to halt and look at Vance. They told him when the man who was with him last, came by, to raise his hand. They left Soper until the last. Vance knew him and raised his hand. Some of the hot headed ones wanted to take him out and hang him right then and there, but they were not permitted to do so. I don't remember all they did, for we had a little summer kitchen outside, and mother kept me out there most of the time, although I would slip in whenever I got a chance to see what was going on.
Everything I saw or heard is as plain to me now as if it had happened yes- terday. I know it was nearly night when they got ready to leave. The men were nearly starved. One after another they came out to the shed. and asked
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HIGH BLUFF ON THE WAPSI PINICON
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for something to eat, until all the bread was gone. Then mother started to mak- ing pancakes and kept at it until we hardly had a thing left in the house to eat. There was no place anywhere near to buy anything. This was the first real ex- citement we ever had.
It appears that after Soper and Vance passed our house on that first occasion they went on until they came to the hill just before Stony creek is reached. At that time the road ran directly over the top of the hill. Soper told Vance that he knew a shorter way by an Indian trail, around under the hill, where the road now runs. Anyone who has passed over that road will remember a shelving rock. When about opposite that rock Soper told Vance he wanted to stop, and for him to walk on, and he would overtake him. That was the last Vance knew until some time towards morning. Soper took Vance's dog with him to the hotel. It was some time after dark when he reached there. The people no- ticed that he seemed uneasy and nervous, and the dog whined and tried to get out. Soper said he wanted to keep him in for fear he might lose him. The dog finally got out and naturally went back to his master. When Vance who was believed to have been killed regained consciousness, he heard his dog bark- ing and the wolves howling. He said he had no idea where he was or what was the matter. It thundered and lightened all night, and he could see the wolves come up very near him, and the dog would chase them away. This was kept up until daylight. The rain was pouring down and by a flash of lightning Vance saw the shelving rock, and he made out to crawl up under it. But for the faithful dog the wolves would have eaten him. He lay there until nearly night the next day when he became so thirsty he crawled on his hands and knees until he got to the creek. He took off his hat and dipped water to drink. Then he could hear teams going over the bridge above, and he crawled along the banks of the creek to the road. By this time it was getting dark again. He was so ex- hausted with the effort made in getting there that several teams passed before he could attract their attention. My folks kept him all winter and gave him as much care as if he had been their own son.
The trial was put off until the spring term of court because Vance was not able to appear in court. The county kept Soper at a farm house near Anamosa all winter with a ball and chain to his leg, for at that time there was no jail in the county. In the spring, a short time before the trial, Vance said he wanted to see Soper, and persuaded my father to take him to where he was. Vance and Soper went off by themselves and had a long talk. When court time came and the trial was called, Vance was not to be found. He had left the country and has never been heard of since. We have always thought they had committed some crime together, and that Vance was afraid to appear against Soper.
To go back to the first, and tell the whole story, Soper got dissatisfied with his home. and left to make his fortune. He went over into Illinois, to the vil- lage of Pecatonica. where he met Vance, a youth about his own age, and they soon became friends. In about a year he persuaded Vance to come home with him, representing that his people were well off, and they could have a good time. They had money enough to pay their way on the stage to Dubuque. Vance had a trunk and a dog. Soper had nothing but the clothes on his back and they were poor. At Dubuque, Soper asked Vance to let him put on his good suit.
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He said he was ashamed to go home with such old clothes; that he had a good suit at home, and would take them off when he got there. They had no way to take the trunk so they left it and tramped the rest of the way. Soper seemed to have no other cause for trying to kill Vance except to get the suit of clothes, and they not very good ones at that.
[Concerning Soper, Dr. W. A. Mirick gives some further information. He says : "This Ed. Soper's father, Isaac Soper, lived near my step-mother's peo- ple, and for a time lived in the family of her sister and husband, Andrew Storrs. When he was a young lad, he at one time pretended to put his hands over the spout of a steaming teakettle and inhale the steam. This pretended act in- duced the little Storrs girl of three or four years to follow his example, which she did. She inhaled the hot steam into her lungs, and died within a few hours in great pain. A few years after the Vance tragedy, Ed. Soper became a horse thief, and he and a man named Gleeson were hanged for this offense near Tip- ton by the vigilance committee. The rope was put over the limb of a tree and about the necks of the men at sunrise. One of them remarked that he would eat his breakfast in h -.. The wagon was driven from under them. and the two were left to strangle. I heard from my mother, when I was a boy of six or seven years, the same story that Mrs. Gallagher has told so well, and also the later events in Ed. Soper's life."-Ed.]
About the year 1853, Daniel Varvel and William Clark conceived the idea of a town and laid out lots on either side of the road as far as their land went. They put about a quarter of an acre in a lot. Varvel owned the land on the east side of the road and Clark on the west. Both sides were a cornfield.
Some time in the summer or fall of 1854, John Moore built a two room house on the lot now owned by Walter Ferguson. They lived in one room and kept a general store in the other. The room was about twelve by fourteen feet. They kept a little of everything from molasses to calico. In a short time their business outgrew the place and they built a frame store building, across the street, about where Proctor's warehouse now stands. Then it was Moore & Christian. After- ward T. C. West had an interest in the store and later Mr. J. C. Lawrence, the father of Orange Lawrence, came from Ohio and bought them out. About this time a man by the name of Wagner built the Monticello house now owned and occupied by Mrs. Fredrieka Hauessler. Abraham and Walter Holston, two brothers, bought the place, and for the first few years, it was the scene of many gay dances and parties. They could both play the "fiddle" as it was called then, and so could get up a dance on short notice. They had half of the upper part of the house done off in one room for a dance hall. When they wanted to have a dance they just cleared the beds out and travelers and boarders had to sit up until the dance was over, which lasted sometimes until near morning.
It was on one of these occasions that Edmund Booth, afterwards publisher of the Anamosa Eureka, with his wife and little daughter, were on their way from Dubuque to Anamosa. They left Cascade some time after dinner, ex- pecting to reach the Monticello house before dark, but there came up a severe blizzard. and it was long after night when they reached the hotel. half frozen. They asked to stay. but were told that there was going to be a dance and that they couldn't possibly keep them. They were informed that half a mile farther
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on Henry Phemister lived, and they could get lodgings there. There was noth- ing left for them to do but push on through the storm, and just as we were going to bed, there came a knock at the door. My father said, "who is it?" for we had locked up for the night. A child's voice answered. My father said, "what can a child be doing out such a night as this" and quickly opened the door. He found a man, woman and child. The child explained that her father and mother were deaf and dumb. (It will be remembered that the elder Booths were mutes. ) We gladly took them in and warmed them, as they were nearly perished with the cold. I remember how strange it seemed to me to see them talk to each other with their fingers, also to see them write on their little slates and pass them to my father. They stayed the next day until the storm abated. They sent us the Anamosa Eureka for a long time. I remember how I read it over and over, until I had it nearly all committed to memory, advertisements and all. It will be remembered that books and papers were very scarce in those days.
On July 3rd, 1855. the first flag was raised in Monticello. This date is cor- rect. I am indebted to my old friend and schoolmate, Lizzie Skelley Coulter, for it, as she was married soon after, and has reasons for determining its correct- ness. The other dates may be somewhat mixed as I have nothing to go by but my memory. The principal persons concerned in the great event of the first flag raising, were the Holsten brothers, Mead, Vaughn, and Newton Coulter. These are all the names I certainly remember, but suppose the rest of the pop- ulation were pretty much all there, giving advice, if nothing more.
The next day was the "Glorious Fourth" and it was one to us. There was a celebration at Little's Grove on the road to Cascade. The boys got four horses and hitched them to a lumber wagon and got Josh Turner, a stage driver, to do the driving. Talk about having a good time! That was my first time out with the young folks, and we had it. We staid at the grove until after the speaking was over, then hitched up, and drove to Scott's tavern at Scottown. All the old settlers know where Scottown used to be. That was my first meal at a hotel. After dinner we drove around some, and got back to the Monticello house some time before dark. They were going to have a dance. But I had strict orders to be at home before night fall, so my young man had to take me home. Thus ended my first, and I think, my happiest Fourth of July celebration.
During the winter we had dances, kissing bees, candy pullings, spelling school, and later on singing school. We would gather up a big load and drive to Castle Grove or Whitemoretown to a spelling school, and in turn the young people from those localities would come to our school. We drove over the prairies when it was so cold the boys would have to take turns driving so as not to freeze their hands. We all sat in the bottom of the wagon or sled as it happened to be, on straw with quilts spread over us.
I think it was the winter of '56 and '57 that we had the big blizzard. Sun- day morning was fair and warm for the time of the year. The day turned out to be beautiful until about four o'clock in the afternoon. Nearly every one that didn't have company went some where. We went to a neighbor's that day, but got home just as the storm broke in its fury. It was all my father could do to get from the stable to the house. On what is now the Hosford farm on the main road, lived an Englishman by the name of Wade. The farm was then owned by
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Mr. Walworth. They were our neighbors on the south. They had a family of ten children, the eldest a boy of nineteen and the youngest about a year old. In the morning the father and mother drove out near Langworthy, taking the baby with them, to a Mr. Scrivens', to spend the day and also to bring one of the daughters home with them to do some sewing. They started back while the sun was yet shining. The storm came up so suddenly that in a few minutes it was im- possible to see anything before them. Before they reached home they lost their way. The horses couldn't face the storm. They drove 'round and 'round, within a short distance of home until the horses gave out. Then Mr. Wade un- hitched the team and spread some quilts down under some willows not far from where Alonzo Hosford used to live. The woman and baby got on them and he spread more over them. Then as we supposed, he started on foot to try to find some place. It wasn't very cold until toward morning then it turned bitter cold with the wind still blowing.
Just as we were getting up the next morning the eldest son came. My father said, "what brings you so early such a cold morning." Then he said his father and mother went away the day before and had not returned yet, and he was afraid they had been lost in the storm. He wanted my father to go with him to look for them. We told him perhaps they had never started home. My father suggested that he go home and get the children up, and as soon as we, could get some breakfast and get the chores done, we would come up and see what could be done. We notified some of the neighbors and they in turn told others until all were informed. My father first drove out to Scrivens' to see if they were there. Then as the news of their real loss spread, all the men, and boys too, who were large enough went to look for them. The snow had covered their tracks except on some high places. They hunted all that day and all night and the next day until about noon, before they found any trace of them. Some one saw the corner of one of the quilts sticking out of the snow, and there they found the woman and baby. They then hunted until near night before they found Wade. He had walked and probably hallooed until he fell dead.
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