USA > Kansas > Marshall County > History of Marshall County, Kansas : its people, industries, and institutions > Part 5
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"The past will always win a glory from its being far."
OLD SETTLERS REUNION ASSOCIATION.
The Marshall County Old Settlers and Pioneers Association was organ- ized in 1879. The object was to bring together the old settlers of this and adjoining counties and to hold annual reunions, at which old friends might meet and by public addresses and the telling of early-day trials, teach the younger people what it cost to build a state. A meeting was held in Blue
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MARSIIALL COUNTY, KANSAS.
Rapids on June 12, 1879, when William Paul, C. E. Tibbetts and T. W. Waterson were appointed a committee to prepare a program for the first Old Settlers Reunion to be held in Marshall county, September 11-12, 1879.
At that first reunion the following officers were elected: A. G. Barrett, president : D. C. Auld and William Thompson, vice-presidents; Frederick Hamilton, treasurer, and J. S. Magill, secretary. Executive committee, Wil- liam Paul, Blue Rapids, chairman; Thomas McCoy, Marysville; W. T. Dwinnell, Frankfort: Robert Smith, Irving: J. L. McChessey, Waterville, and Judge Madden, of Guittard. On January Ist, 1917, but one of the first officers of this association was yet living-Robert Smith, of Frankfort.
Since that first meeting at Blue Rapids the association has never failed to meet. The last meeting being held in Marysville on September 20 to 23. 1916.
This Old Settlers Reunion organization has grown to be the "biggest thing." in the way of an annual gathering, held in the county. Although it has grown away from the original idea of a gathering of pioneers and has be- come the forum of the politician. yet it is an event that gathers a crowd and there are still some of the pioneers who are present and are actively inter- ested in the welfare of the organization.
The officers for 1917 are: J. M. Watson, president ; Howard Reed, secretary.
The following address delivered by Mrs. Andrew J. Travelute at the annual Old Settlers' Reunion at Marysville in September, 1916, was greatly enjoyed by the many pioneers who were present.
Mrs. Travelute was formerly Elizabeth Mohrbacher, daughter of Jacob Mohrbacher, and one of the first teachers in Marshall county. During this address a number of pioneer ladies sat on the platform knitting, spinning and sewing as in olden times. Among them were Mrs. H. P. Benson, Mrs. E. A. Scott, Mrs. Sarah McKee, Mrs. M. Roseberry, Mrs. Washburn, Mrs. Liel:, Mrs. Bunton and Mrs. Heister.
Mrs. Travelute's address follows .
The time has arrived when it becomes the duty of the people of Marshall county to perpetuate the names of their early pioneers.
Those men and women, who in their prime of life, entered the wilds of Kansas and tilled the virgin soil have nearly all passed to their graves ; the number remaining who can relate the incidents is becoming small. The frontier is gone and those who removed it are gone: and those who assisted in removing it are going one by one.
Therefore, my friends, one and all, we who are gathered here, let us
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dedicate the thirty-eighth annual Early Settlers' Reunion of Marshall county to the sacred memory of those dear ones who braved life's battles here on Kansas soil when all was a wilderness. They came with the inspiration of hope and love for their dear ones who are enjoying the fruits of their hard labor, because what those noble pioneers had to suffer, only God and the recording angel can disclose.
During those years, when the white men were traveling through Kan- sas, they were not making settlements here. The country remained in the undisputed possession of the Indians; the white men did not want it as yet. They looked upon these vast prairies not as a resource. but as so much land to be crossed in reaching places further west.
But changing conditions in the states east of the Mississippi river made people begin to look upon Kansas in a different light. The country there was becoming thickly settled and people wanted the lands of the Indians. As the Indians had all been removed to these western plains, the white man could not settle on these reservations without the consent of the Indians. According to the treaties, the Indians were promised their land so long as grass should grow or water run. But it soon developed that the white man wanted Kansas land. Also, in the year 1854. we find the tribes being trans- ferred to the Indian territory. now Oklahoma, where the remnants of various tribes still remain.
Although Kansas was not used during those early years to make homes for the whites, a few hundred people came here. They were of three differ- ent classes : missionaries, soldiers and fur traders.
FIRST MISSIONARY AMONG INDIANS.
The attempt to civilize the Indians began in the days of the early explorers, but it was on Kansas soil that the first missionary lost his life. This man was Father Padillo, a Jesuit, who came with Coronado on his journey. Father Padillo became much interested in the Indians, but his noble work was of short duration, for he was soon killed by some of the tribes.
Later, when Kansas became a part of the United States, a number of missions were established by Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians and Cath- olie churches. Kansas remained in the possession of the tribes until the year 1854, when it was organized into a territory.
About this time the New England Aid Company was organized. It gathered and published information concerning the new country, and under
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the government of these companies, newspapers were filled with descriptions of the loveliness, the fertility and the future greatness of the territory, and people were urged to come to Kansas at once, both to secure the advantages of the country and to help in saving it from slavery. They lived in sod houses, log cabins and dugouts.
Arriving with my parents in the small hamlet of Marysville, in the spring of 1860, about eight months previous to the time when Kansas was admitted to the Union as a state, the people had almost as few comforts of life as when they first came to the territory. A few of them had come with little ideas of hardships of frontier life, and others had believed such condi- tions would last but a short time. Many returned to their Eastern homes and to wife's folks, because they lacked the energy to rough it through. But the greater body of Kansas pioneers had come with a two-fold purpose : of making homes and making a free state.
PIONEERS SHOULD NOT BE FORGOTTEN.
The pioneers who followed a trackless west should never be lost sight of. They were good, representative men where they came from, and were not to be discouraged.
In looking back fifty-six years, I feel proud of my early associates. Most of them are gone; only a few are left to confirm the story we have to tell. Frontier life is always hard, but it was rendered many times harder here in Kansas by years of strife and warfare.
In these days of the railways, the good roads and the Ford automobiles : of the telegraph and telephone and the rural mail routes, it is difficult to realize what life on the Kansas prairies meant in the sixties. The virtue of the Kansas pioneer homes has never furnished theme for song or story, because it is not so easy to grow sentimental over sod houses or log cabins or dugouts, or to romance over slab shacks that were window- less lest the prowling savages seek their vantages ; and floorless for want of means.
The privations and sacrifices and the loneliness of pioneer life fell most heavily on the women. Business and necessity brought the men together occasionally, but the woman in the isolation of her prairie home often saw no friendly face for a month. It was in the home of the pioneer woman that the lessons of self-abnegation and self-denial, deprivation and courage in the face of hourly danger were learned. The log cabin of Kansas had never about it the elements that render its photograph in the least picturesque.
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But my dear friends, I can say in truth that the family altar was as cherished there as though in marble walls.
THE PIONEER FARMER'S WIFE.
While there comes to my mind so vividly a true picture of the pioneer farmer's wife. I shall attempt to outline it to you for the benefit of the young women on the farms of dear, glorious Kansas of today. My memory places before me a toil-worn woman, standing in front of the dugout, with the sun- flowers growing on its sodded roof. She is gazing over the vast expanse of prairie that stretches ont before her. She is gazing eastward: her vision is dimmed, because countless millions of grasshoppers have celipsed the sun- light.
Her heart is filled with homesickness and regret. She is sadly think- ing of her dear father and mother, whose tender embrace her poor, lone- some heart is longing for, and of that dear old home and its sweet comforts. and while the hot winds from the south are scorching her hands and face, and while baby is asleep in the homemade cradle and there happens to be no Indians in sight-she hurriedly takes the water pail and goes down to the slough, which is more than a quarter of a mile distant, to bring the water wherewith to prepare the meal for her tired husband.
The sweetness in performing her household duties, and the hope for the new home she has come to help to build, softens every regret. It is that divine virtue called hope which is now depicted in her dear face. Hope and courage. the "} will," is what helped to make Kansas glorious.
Speaking of the grasshopper-it happened a farmer wanted to borrow his neighbor's wagon, and the box had been taken off; so he asked the woman of the house where he could find it. She told him she did not know where it could be found-like as not the grasshoppers had swallowed it. This was in Balderson township.
Although the pioneers of Kansas were deprived of the various good things which we have to eat, they were more rugged and enjoyed better health, with the exception of malarial fever in some localities. They lived chiefly ou corn bread, buffalo meat or bacon, sorghum molasses, barley coffee. wild fruits and on very rare occasions a pumpkin pie, providing the grass- hoppers did not eat the vines or the hot winds did not cook them before the pumpkins were fit for use.
While making mention of the corn bread. I recall the time when some i the pioneers had no other means of grinding the corn wherewith to make
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this bread than an old tin milk pan that leaked too bad for any other use. They would use a hammer and nail and punch it full of holes and that left the bottom of the pan rough enough that you could take an ear of corn and grate it down to the cob. Then the trouble with some people was they did not have grease enough in the house to grease the pan to bake it in, to pre- vent it sticking to the bottom of the pan. They would have to go to the neighbors to borrow their greaser. And. remember, the neighbors did not live close enough together so you could have a talk across the fence, and there was no telephone to go to and say, "May I come over and borrow your greaser ?"
PLEASURES THAT OFFSET PRIVATIONS.
Although there was privation and hard work. there was also some pleasure. There were the literary societies, the singing schools, the spelling schools held in the little log school house. And country dances and the corn husking bees. I recall a husking bee when John Shroyer invited the young men and boys of the neighborhood to come and husk corn during the day time and at night they were to bring their best girl or grown sister along and enjoy some fun. Now. Mrs. Shroyer had baked some pumpkin pies for our refreshment. The house. being a log cabin with one room and a fire place, and when company came in pioneer days the furniture had to be set out of doors in order to provide room. This was the case here. This was the month of November and the weather was very cold, and the mis- tress of the house, not knowing what to do with her pies until she wanted to serve them, took them to the rail corn crib and placed them on the newly husked corn. A few hours afterwards, when she wanted to serve them they were frozen so hard it was impossible for her to make use of the knife. Only for the forethought of our friend. R Y. Shibley, who is still in our midst, who was one of those young men who make all kinds of promises to the young ladies. He called for a long-handled shovel, and he placed those frosted pies in groups of three or four on it and very patiently held them over the fire in the fireplace to thaw them out, then, without removing them from the shovel, passed thiem to the boys and girls.
The girls wore calico dresses and some of the young men were dressed in their homespun and some in their jeans, while the young swells wore "Palm Beach" trousers made of new grain sacks and down on the outside seams you could see these words, stamped in black capital letters: "Amos- keag seamless. Patent applied for."
There comes to my mind the time when my father having built a new
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house of considerable size, on his farm south of town, the young people of Marysville came to surprise us and give us what they called a house warm- ing. 1 think there were about eight couples of them. I recall the names of some that were present, namely: Mr. and Mrs. Perry Hutchinson, John Hornbeck, Henry Devoe, John Webber, Ed Lovell, Snowden Transue, R. Y. Shibley and 1. B. Davis of this city. Among the young ladies I recall the names of Kate Webber. Emma Webber, Maggie Smith, Edith Lovell, Belle Waterson and .Annie Bendel. My father being a musician, they prevailed upon him to bring forth his clarionet and play while they danced. Then at the hour of midnight, my father excused himself and retired for the night, when our friend, I. B. Davis, who was endowed with a talent for music. made good use of the instrument, playing all kinds of airs while the dance went on.
SPELLING SCHOOLS.
My dear friends, while it is impossible for me to describe to you in words the sweet charms of those tunes which Mr. Davis produced on my father's clarionet, because more than half a century has passed since the above mentioned event took place, I will venture to say to you that I am greatly surprised to note the automobiles have been so constructed, after so great a lapse of time that at least some of them are able to resound the echo thereof.
While making mention of the spelling schools in pioneer days, they were well patronized by young and old. I recall a time when the teacher gave out words of two syllables. There was a young man present from the state of Illinois-you all know Ilinois claims she has no illiterates-and when it came this young man's turn to spell the word "austere." he spelled "offsteer." He had been in Kansas long enough to learn to drive oxen.
In the life of every man and woman who walked on Kansas soil, is a lesson that should not be lost on those who follow. Coming generations will appreciate the volume which is at the present time being compiled by Mrs. E. E. Forter of this city. It will be cherished by everyone as a sacred treasure. Although Marysville was but a small hamlet, with a few small stores, it was the only trading point within a distance of twenty-five miles and I recall the days when the women came here riding in lumber wagons. drawn by oxen, and no spring seats to sit on. While they were joy-riding they would knit a pair of socks for their husbands-busy all the while. Industry and economy was the motto in pioneer days.
My dear friends, you may reasonablly feel that you have been no unim-
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portant factor in the elevation of Marshall county to its present position. I well remember the historic inscriptions on some of the prairie schooners which used to pass through Marysville in the pioneer days. Some read, "Pike's Peak or Bust," while others read, "Bound for Kansas, the light- house of the world."
You have aided in no small degree in the making of Kansas one of the brightest stars in the great constellation of American states, in her greatness, her power and her wealth, and while we are enjoying these great blessings, let us ever hold sacred the memory of those noble men and women who removed the frontier from the wilds of Kansas. And let us never forget to thank Him who doeth all things well that we are permitted to call Marshall county our home.
FRANK J. MARSHALL.
Frank J. Marshall, whose name the county bears, was born in Lee county, Virginia, April 3, 1816. He was educated in the common schools and in William and Mary's College. In early manhood he went West and located in Ray county, Missouri, later moving to Weston, Platte county, from which place he joined the forty-niners to go to the California gold fields. Upon reaching the Big Blue river, he at once saw the necessity of a ferry which he built and operated near the Independence Crossing for several years. After Captain Standberry laid out the Ft. Leavenworth and Ft. Kearney military road, Marshall followed the new road and established a ferry about two hundred yards up stream from where the steel bridge at Marysville now stands.
In 1858-59 gold was discovered in the Pikes Peak and Clear creek regions in Colorado and soon after the gold fever affected Marshall. He left the county and the town which he had named and again became a pioneer in the mining districts of Clear creek and Gilpin counties, Colorado. F. J. Marshall built the first house in Marysville and he built the first brick busi- ness house in Denver, Colorado. He died on November 25, 1895, after a most eventful life, leaving a wife, four sons and a daughter. Mrs. Marshall is still living with her daughter in New York City.
CANDIDATE FOR GOVERNOR.
In 1857 Gen. F. J. Marshall was the pro-slavery candidate for governor and George W. Smith was the candidate of the Free State party.
MARSHALL COUNTY, KANSAS.
Smith's majority over Marshall was 130. Smith received 6.875 and Marshall. 6.745. In Marshall county, Marshall received 72 votes and Smith. 47 votes : total 119.
The vote on the other territorial officers was exactly alike in each case. Governor, secretary, auditor, treasurer, congressman, each received 72 votes as pro-slavery candidates and 47 votes were recorded for the Free State men.
At this same election a vote was taken on the adoption of the Lecomp- ton constitution. "with slavery". or "without slavery", and 232 votes were cast and counted for "with slavery", against 41 votes cast for "without slavery." This was in Marshall county. where Marshall himself was a candidate for governor and where the vote on territorial officers in no case exceeded 119.
Marshall never served in any military organization and the title of "General" was purely nominal.
He was well known by many of the pioneer settlers and was a man of strong personality, devoted to his family and scrupulous in his religious duties. Mrs. M. A. B. Martin, who knew the family well, says: "Mr. Mar- shall and family always observed the Sabbath. They would read from the Bible and then all join in singing hymns."
Mr. Marshall built a good residence on the spot where Dr. Jennie Eddy's office now stands. Mrs. Dan Griswold made her home with them for awhile, when a little girl, and remembers Mrs. Marshall as a woman of great kindness.
MARSHALL'S REMINISCENCES.
The following is F. J. Marshall's personal letter written to and read by J. S. Magill at the Old Settlers Reunion held at Irving in August. 1895. It is given in full in order that the readers of the history may have personal knowledge of the views of the man for whom the county is named and for the further reason that it tells the story of early days of Marysville.
To James S. Magill. Esq., Secretary of the Old Settlers Pioneer AAssociation :
My Dear Sir-I have read with pleasure the very kind invitation of your committee to be with you on the occasion of the meeting of the Old Set- tlers' Pioneer Association of Marshall county, Kansas. Nothing would afford me more pleasure than to avail myself of your kind invitation and to meet the people of Marshall county, as well as those from other parts of the state, and I had made all arrangements to be with them at their coming reunion, but at the last moment my failing health forbids me making the
GEN. FRANK MARSHALL.
MRS. MARY MARSHALL.
PETER FROOM.
CON SMITH, An Old-Time Stage Driver.
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long trip and herewith I enclose a short history of my recollections of the olden times of Kansas pioneer life.
In the early settlement of Kansas, it is to be remembered, I established a trading post at the government crossing of the Big Blue river on the road leading to the great West, over which went all the travel starting from Ft. Leavenworth and all other points below old Ft. Kearney on the Missouri river to new Ft. Kearney, Ft. Larimer and all the Indian country, Utah, Oregon, Washington and the great emigration to California, which meant at least five thousand to ten thousand people a day from April to July. Over this route went the great pony express enterprise to California, which the country now knows partially led to the building of the Union Pacific rail- road. Most of the time the river could be forded, but often even for six weeks at a time it could not be crossed except by means of the ferry. This was one of the greatest overland thoroughfares which the country has ever known.
SEEKS TO ESTABLISH FERRY.
I applied to the Indian agent for the privilege of establishing a ferry and trading post at the point where Marysville now stands. It was in the Indian country, and there was no particular agent having jurisdiction over this part of the Indian lands. He informed me that it was the battle-ground of the different tribes when at war with each other, hence a dangerous place for the establishment of a trading post, as I proposed.
I then applied to Major Ogden. the quartermaster at Ft. Leavenworth, for a contract with the government to put in boats, build ware- and store- houses and to supply troops returning from the western forts in the winter time, and he protested that on account of its dangerous proximity to the ground described such an establishment might not last long without military protection. I expressed myself, however, as willing to arrange for my own protection, to which he afterward gave his consent. On securing his per- mission, I proceeded at once, bought a piece of artillery, mounted it, loaded my own wagons and was on the way to the Big Blue crossing at the point referred to within twenty-four hours after my contract with the government. This arrangement was universally concurred in by the officers at Ft. Leaven- worth. Colonel Sumner, who then commanded the Second dragoons and who afterwards commanded a division in the late war, and Lieutenant Stuart, who was his quartermaster on expeditions into the Indian country in the spring and summer and afterwards known as the rebel, General Stuart. of
(5)
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the Black Horse cavalry, on returning late in the fall crossed at this point, always required supplies for his soldiers and horses, knew of the facts in connection with my enterprise, and I had their hearty co-operation.
TERRITORIAL GOVERNMENT ESTABLISHIED.
This undertaking was commenced as early as the year 1852, and led two years later to the establishment of a territorial government for Kansas and Nebraska, a brief statement of which may not be uninteresting at this time.
In 1851 the Big Blue river rose to the top of its banks, and perhaps this fact had something to do with the facility with which I secured permission from the government officers to carry out my plans for establishing a ferry, etc.
Suffice to say that I succeeded in every way, nor did I have the serious trouble with the Indians that had been apprehended, they regarding me as occupying the same position relatively to them as did the military forces at Ft. Kearney.
All the lands west of the Missouri river at that time, not within the boundaries of California, had no name except in a general way as the "Indian country." the "Great American desert," or "Nebraska," but there were sparse settlements in the mining country now known as the state of Nevada, and in the Mormon settlements of what is now known as Utah.
The next move I made was to bring about the organization of a terri- torial government of the "Great American desert," so-called, and it was brought about, I might say, somewhat in an accidental way.
The Pottawatomic Indian agent. Major Whitfield, had started up the Missouri river from St. Louis to pay the Indians at the Pottawatomic post their annuity, but his boat was detained by running on a sandbar and he was delayed several days beyond the pay day.
A large body of the Pottawatomie Indians were educated Indians, hay- ing been educated at St. Mary's Mission on the reservation, and were known as Mission Indians, to distinguish them from the prairie Indians.
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