USA > Tennessee > Old times in Tennessee, with historical, personal, and political scraps and sketches > Part 2
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on account of not learning, but because of the " pranks" I played upon the pupils, and sometimes upon the school-master himself. I was a pretty good mimic, and frequently imitated the "gab " of the old pedagogue to the no little amusement of the boys and girls, and notwithstanding I was frequently whipped for it, I still kept up the habit, with a full knowledge that I was endangering my back. Although a boy of only ten years of age, I felt like Col. Robert M. Burton, an eloquent lawyer, and a great wit, with whom in after life I was frequently associated in arguing cases at the bar, while we were often pitted against each other. He took a peculiar delight in indulging his extraordinary powers of repartee and ridicule, which frequently involved him in personal rencounters. So I, for indulging my propensity, frequently felt the rod, well laid on by the old school-master, as well as being involved in " fisticuffs" with the boys. I made it a rule never to apologize through compulsion, and often wore a swollen nose or a black eye as the result of my temerity.
The second year after my father settled on Bledsoe's creek, there appeared in that section a dreadful malady called the milk- poison. It came from the cows eating a peculiar species of weed or licking some mineral. which poisoned their milk, and thus passed into the system of those who used the milk. After eating this weed or partaking of the mineral a few times, the cows would come running down the mountain, plunge into the creek, drink heartily of the water, and then come out upon the bank, lie down and die in a short time. This was a new disease to us, and we did not know the cause of it, but some of the old settlers knew that it was milk-poison that was killing so large a number of cattle. This disease appeared in the month of August. I was the first attacked by it, and was compelled to stop attending school. I was able to walk about for some time, though growing worse all the while. One day I walked down to the creek and there found a dead cow, which was being devoured by buzzards. Finding they could not Hy, I returned to the house and obtained from my mother a bunch of " thrums" eut from cloth she had woven. I then retraced my steps to the creek, caught about twenty-five buzzards, tied them together, 'around the necks, and drove them, like so many circus-horses, up into the yard ; but there my fun ended, for my mother made me turn them loose. They wandered
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about and died in a few days, from the effects of eating of the carcass of the poisoned cow. I continued to grow worse, and was finally confined to my bed. There was no doctor in the neighborhood, and no one knew of a remedy for the disease. I lay for weeks in a very critical condition, having suffered all the time with terrible inward fevers; indeed, my stomach seemed to be on fire. I had an iron constitution, which finally wore out the disease, when I commenced to mend slowly. I soon regained strength enough to sit up, and while my mother was washing one day, she sat me upon a chair in the shade of our cabin. They had given me warm water to drink for several weeks, and being now in full view of a large cave-spring near our house, I felt a strong desire to taste of its cool, limpid water. When my mother stepped away for a few minutes, I crawled to the spring and lay down in the branch, which cooled me off wonderfully, while I slaked my thirst with copious draughts of water. My mother soon discovered me, and was terribly frightened, lest the water should prove the death of me, as it had been of the cows. She picked me up and carried me into the house, where she divested me of my wet clothes and wrapped me in blankets. I was soon in a heavy perspiration, which happily resulted in expelling the poison from my system. From that day my recovery was rapid.
The educational advantages enjoyed by Cairo were much better than in the neighborhood where my father resided. Cairo was situated on the Cumberland river, and was the rival of Gallatin. It was the home of our uncle, Maj. Jo. H. Conn, and our two aunts, Mrs. Brown and Mrs. Tompkins, and my brother, Dr. James Guild, who was some four years my senior, had resided with them from the time my father removed from' Virginia. Upon my convalescence, I was taken to their house, and again placed at school.
In the fall of 1813, my dear mother was attacked with the milk- poison, and died after ten days of intense suffering. Her remains were brought to Cairo, and interred in the family burying ground. She was a devoted Christian and an exemplary member of the Methodist Episcopal Church. Her funeral was a very impressive one, the sermon on the occasion being preached by Father James Gwin, the chaplain to Gen. Jackson in his brilliant campaigns.
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He was the father of Samuel Gwin, the tried and trusted friend of Gen. Jackson, who had accompanied him in his military cam- paigns, and who fought a most sanguinary duel with Mr. Camp- bell in Mississippi, in which Campbell was killed and Gwin severely wounded, from the effects of which he died a few years afterward. Father Gwin was also the father of Dr. Wm. M. Gwin, once a distinguished member of Congress, and now a resident of California. My mother died when young, being not more than thirty-five years of age. She was a woman of remarkable beauty, finely formed, with jet black hair and eyes, a complexion as white as snow, and cheeks as red as a rose. She was well educated and possessed rare accomplishments. Poor mother, she saw her best and most happy days in her native Virginia. My father's mercantile embarrassments left our family poor, but my mother accepted the situation with resignation and Christian fortitude, and acted her part with a nobleness that won for her the highest esteem.
My father was devotedly attached to my mother, and her death made a deep impression on his mind, and at her grave he seemed to have a presentiment that his own death would soon come, for he remarked to my brother and myself that he would soon follow her. Afterward he embraced us and told us again that he should soon leave us ; that we must be good boys, and handed us a small Bible, and told us to read it and follow its precepts; that it was the only legacy he had to leave us. This occurred nearly seventy years ago, and his dying words, though he was then apparently in good health, were engraven on my heart and will never be forgotten. The day following the burial of my mother, I returned with my father to our humble cabin of mourning. The day suc- ceeding our arrival, my father was stricken down with the milk- poison in the most violent form. The disease had become so fatal as to alarm the entire neighborhood, and it was feared by all and regarded by many as contagious. In the excitement thus created, neighbors would not visit houses where the disease pre- vailed. I and a servant alone attended my father, who, all the while, grew worse. He sunk rapidly under his intense suffering, and died during the week in which he was attacked. There was no one present when he died but myself. Calmly, peacefully he passed away to the shadowy land. This sad event occurred about
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an hour before sunset. There I was alone, a mere child, with no one to care for the corpse or direct me what to do. In the excited condition of the neighbors, I thought it impossible to get the. necessary assistance to give him proper and decent burial; be- sides, our relatives at Cairo should be apprised of his death. I debated with myself as to what course I should pursue. Should I appeal to the neighbors for assistance, or should I go to Cairo and convey the sad intelligence to my uncle? I finally deter- mined to go that night to Cairo, twenty miles distant; but there was no one to take care of the house and keep watch over the dead until I should return. So I barred the door securely, and leaving my father as he had died, mounted a horse, and started a little after dark on my sad errand. I had proceeded but a short distance when I discovered that a dark cloud was rising in the West, the direction in which I was going. It advanced with great rapidity, accompanied by heavy peals of thunder and vivid flashes of lightning, while the wind blew a perfect hurricane. It seemed to me but the lapse of a few minutes until the storm broke upon me with terrible fury, and I found myself in the heaviest rain-fall I had ever witnessed. My course lay down the valley, through which the creek ran, but torrent after torrent came rushing down the mountains, until the creek became so swollen that it could not be crossed without imminent danger of being drowned. Still the rain continued to pour down in tor- rents, the thunder to roll in deep reverberations, and the light- ning to flash in the most vivid manner. It was an awfully grand spectacle to thus witness the war of the elements. My horse became frightened and refused to go forward. I then determined to leave the valley and the creek, and make for the hills on my left, and make my way through them as best I could. The rain continued for hours, accompanied by heavy thunder and sharp lightning. Utter darkness prevailed, relieved only by occasional flashes of lightning. I was now lost but not bewildered. My heart was nearly broken .with grief at the death of my mother, followed so soon by that of my father, the latter of whom now lay a corpse in our lonely cabin, unconscious of the terrible scenes through which I was passing. Byron's description of a thunder storm in the Alps is a brilliant flight of the poet's fancy, and a fine description of just such a scene as I witnessed on that night,
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all the more impressive to me now as I look back upon that grand and awful display and think of my sad condition.
"The sky is changed !- and such a change! Oh night, And storm, and darkness, ye are wondrous strong,
Yet lovely in your strength, as is the light Of a dark eye in woman ! Far along,
From peak to peak, the rattling crags among Leaps the live thunder! Not from one lone cloud,
But every mountain now hath found a tongue,
And Jura answers, through her misty shroud,
Back to the joyous Alps, who call to her aloud ! *
Now, where the quiet Rhone thus hath cleft his way The mightiest of the storms hath ta'en his stand :
For here, not one, but many, make their play, And fling their thunder-bolts from hand to hand,
Flashing and cast around : of all the band, The brightest through these parted hills hath fork'd His lightnings-as if he did understand, That in such gaps as desolation work'd,
There the hot shot should blast whatever therein lurk'd."
All this I saw and felt in my lonely night-journey through the hills-a trip rendered doubly lonely by a bleeding heart which still bears the scars placed there by the untimely death of both my parents. In the utter darkness, it was impossible for me to proceed through the dense forest and thick undergrowth, so I re- mained stationary until the storm had spent its fury, until the tempest-tossed cloud had poured out its watery accumulations, and passed away, and the stars came out as silent spectators to look upon the deluged earth. The wind had veered to the North and blew a mournful dirge to the lone wanderer. I was in a sad plight, with light clothing and thoroughly drenched, for the night- ride before me. There was no road, not even a " cow-path " to direct my way ; the only signal I had as to the course I should follow was the roaring of the swollen creek, whose mad volume was rushing down the valley, bearing away or overleaping all opposition. I struck out by the dim light of the stars and kept in hearing of the roaring creek, which emptied into the Cumber- land one mile above Cairo. I traveled slowly, nearly frozen, for something like three hours, when, about one hour before day, I saw occasionally, through the openings in the forest, a large and rather brilliant light which seemed to swing in a half circle.
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I stopped to consider what it might be. I had heard from old people stories about "Jack o' the Lantern," or " Will o' the Wisp," appearing in the night, which presaged evil to any one who en- countered it. The question presented itself to my young mind (for I was only ten years old then), should I remain stationary, in the hope that I would not be discovered; endeavor to escape, by taking an opposite direction from its course ; or march up to it and risk the consequences. I had been pelted by the pitiless storm, had been lost for hours, and was almost frozen-an afflic- tion greater than that of Lear-so I concluded to advance, be my fate what it might. I was nerved to go forward with something like the spirit of Hamlet :
" Angels and ministers of grace defend us !- Be thou a spirit of health, or goblin damn'd, Bring with thee airs from heaven, or blasts from hell, Be thy intents wicked or charitable, Thou com'st in such a questionable shape, That I will speak to thee."
On arriving within about one hundred yards of the mysterious light, I hailed it, to know who or what it was, when the answer came in a cheerful voice that it was Abram, one of uncle Isaac Bledsoe's faithful servants, who was out 'possum hunting. On coming up to me, I told him I was lost, and had been in that condition all night. Learning who I was, and the errand that had taken me out upon so inclement a night as the earlier portion had been, he kindly piloted me to the residence of his master. I had to be lifted from my horse and carried into a room where there was a warm fire. I was kindly and hospitably cared for by the old people, dry clothes given me, and a good breakfast provided for myself and horse. I will always cherish the mem- ory of uncle Isaac Bledsoe and Mrs. Peggy Bledsoe with the most lively feelings of love and gratitude.
I continued my journey and arrived at my uncle's in Cairo about twelve o'clock that day. I there delivered the painful in- telligence of the death of my father. Arrangements were made and his remains were brought down the next day. The sermon at his funeral was preached by Father Green, and he was laid by the side of my dear mother, on the very day that he told us the sad event would take place.
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III.
REMINISCENCES OF THE MEN AND WOMEN OF HALF A CEN- TURY AGO-THEIR MANNERS, CUSTOMS, AND PATRIOTISM.
HAVING the misfortune to lose our parents, my brother and myself found a home with our uncle, Maj. Josephus H. Conn, and our aunts, who voluntarily assumed the position of locus pa- rentis to each of us. They provided for all our wants, and edu- cated us in the common schools and academies. Having achieved pretty fair success in the school at Cairo, we entered the academy at Gallatin, at the head of which was that ripe scholar and ac- complished gentleman, John Hall. When he retired I was placed under the charge of the able and learned Christian gen- tleman, Mr. George Me Whirter, in Wilson county, and was sub- sequently transferred to the academy of the Rev. Thomas B. Craighead, a finished scholar and great theologian, whose school was located on his own premises six miles East of Nashville. The moral principles and great virtues which characterized these gentlemen, the pure and exemplary lives they led, made a deep impression upon my young heart, and served to light the path of ' duty and honor in my journey through life. I have always cher- ished their memory, and love to recall their noble example, and I freely acknowledge the debt of gratitude I owe them.
I must pause here and take "a bird's-eye view" of the state of affairs in 1812 in the middle portion of Tennessee. The original settlers comprised a large number who had fought the battles of the revolution, and other patriotic citizens of Virginia and North Carolina, who scaled the Alleghany mountains and pushed their way through privations and dangers into the wilds of Middle Tennessee, the reserved hunting grounds of the red men. Their patriotism, energy, courage, and virtues were in- herited by their children, and leavened the succeeding generations who assisted in building up a great and populous State.
Col. Bledsoe, and Spencer, and Boon, in 1775, descended the Cumberland river in a canoe and explored the country, which was filled with buffalo, deer, bear, panthers, and wolves; indeed,
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all kinds of game abounded in the greatest profusion. Spencer made his home for three years in a hollow sycamore tree that overlooked Bledsoe's Lick, in Sumner county, and from this hid- ing place slew the buffalo and deer that resorted to the lick. Having visited his native State, he returned to Middle Tennes- see early in 1780, and planted a crop of corp. Under the pre- emption act, he obtained a grant for six hundred and forty acres of land, situated near where Gallatin now stands. It was called "Spencer's Choice." He subsequently visited his native State, and returning alone on foot, was attacked by Indians and killed on what is known as Spencer's Hill, where he was buried.
Emigration was early directed toward the fertile valley of the Cumberland. A settlement of less than a dozen families was formed near Bledsoe's Lick in 1778. The following year Gen. James Robertson and eight others, one of whom was a negro servant, settled near the French Lick, and planted a field of corn where the city of Nashville now stands. Shortly after their ar- rival other emigrants, under the lead of Mansco, joined them. These emigrants also planted corn, and the whole party built block-houses on the bluff preparatory to the removal of their families in the succeeding fall. After the crop was made, three of their number were left to keep the buffalo out of the unen- closed fields of corn, while the remainder of the party went back to the Watauga Settlement for their families and other emigrants. Gen. Robertson was among those who returned. He gathered a company of nearly three hundred, many of them young men without families, who set out late in the fall for their new homes. The route pursued was by Cumberland Gap, and a circuit through Kentucky, which brought them to their destination through Sumner county. While Robertson and his party were thus reach- ing the Cumberland by the circuitous and dangerous "trace" through the wilderness of Kentucky, others of their countrymen and countrywomen were undergoing greater hardships, enduring greater sufferings, and experiencing greater privations upon an- other route, not less circuitous and far more perilous, in aiming at the same destination. Gen. Robertson left the Watauga Set- tlement with the understanding that his friend Col. John Donel- son, a wealthy Virginia surveyor, was at once to follow him to the French Lick with a party of emigrants, among whom were
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families of emigrants who had gone out the previous spring, Gen. Robertson's family being of the number. To avoid the toil and peril of the route through the wilderness, Col. Donelson con- ceived the idea of reaching the new settlement by water, a dis- tance of more than two thousand miles. No man, either white or red, had ever attempted the voyage, which was really more dangerous than the overland route, while there were equally as many Indians to be encountered. "The project, in short," says Parton, " was worthy, for its boldness, of the destined father-in- law of Gen. Jackson. Among those who shared the dangers of this voyage was Rachel Donelson, the leader's daughter, a black- eyed, black-haired brunette, as gay, bold, and handsome a lass as ever danced on the deck of a flatboat, or took the helin while her father took a shot at the Indians." Col. Donelson and party left Fort Patrick Henry, on the Holston river, in what is now Haw- kins county, on December 22, 1779, in "the good boat Adven- ture," but they were more than two months reaching Knoxville. Meantime they were joined by several other boats with emigrants bound for the lower country. Many and dire were the mishaps that befel them, but on the 20th of March, 1780, they reached the confluence of the Tennessee and Ohio rivers. Here the boats parted, some descending the Mississippi with Natchez as the objective point, while others were bound for the Illinois; "among the rest my son-in-law and daughter," wrote Col. Don- elson in his journal. " We now part, perhaps to meet no more, for I am determined to pursue my course, happen what will." And so he did, and this entry in his journal, under date of April 24, 1780, shows that he accomplished his object after a most haz- ardous voyage of more than four months : " This day we arrived at our journey's end at the Big Salt Lick, where we have the pleasure of finding Capt. Robertson and his company. It is a source of satisfaction to us to be enabled to restore to him and others their families and friends, who were entrusted to our care, and who, some time since, perhaps, despaired of ever meeting again. Though our prospects at present are dreary, we have found a few log cabins which have been built on a cedar bluff above the lick by Capt. Robertson and company." There was a happy meeting of husbands and wives, parents and children. This company was a great acquisition to the feeble settlement,
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and their success encouraged others to try their fortunes in this section.
Boon, as new-comers arrived, became restless and pushed into the wilds of Kentucky, where he performed many heroic deeds. When that State began to grow rapidly in population, though enfeebled by the hardships he had endured, and frequently on " the border of extinction," his adventurous spirit impelled him further west, and he extended the circle of civilization into the wilderness of Missouri, where he died.
Col. Anthony Bledsoe, who had explored this section, returned to his native State, and in 1779 headed a number of emigrants, among whom were his brother, Col. Isaac Bledsoe, Hugh Rogan, Shelby Blackman, Morgan Hall, and John E. Peyton, with their families, and others, and blazed their way through the wilderness amid dangers from savages and wild beasts, and settled in Sum- ner county. In that year (1779) Col. Bledsoe secured a grant of five thousand acres of land, called the Greenfield Survey, which was perhaps the finest tract of land in the world. It was upon this body of land that these emigrants settled. They built stock- ades at Greenfield, Morgan's Station, Bledsoe's Lick, Sigler's Station, Keiff's, and Mansco's Lick. As immigration continued to flow in from year to year, in constantly increasing streams, the families occupied the stockades, that they might be secure from the attacks of the Indians. The men cultivated small patches of corn, one portion doing the work while the other stood guard with their irusty rifles to prevent the Indians surprising and kill- ing the laborers. Notwithstanding the precautions taken, many men were killed and many others severely wounded, in the nu- merous skirmishes that ensued, or by being surprised and at- tacked while at work. Col. Anthony Bledsoe was killed in July, 1787; Col. Isaac Bledsoe, his brother, in 1793; Capt. Hail, the father of Gen. Wm. Hall and John Hall, heretofore spoken of, was attacked while moving bis family from his house to the lick. and he and a son were killed and scalped. The two Bledsoes had each a son killed at the lick, and they had two brothers killed near Gen. Daniel Smith's, a pioneer of great intelligence and bravery, afterward a leading member of Congress rom this State. Sigler's Station was attacked and sacked, and Miss Wil- son, the daughter of an old pioneer, was captured by the Indians
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and held a prisoner for three years, when she was restored to her family.
Greenfield Station was attacked by two hundred Indian war- riors, and by a gallant move of Gen. Hall, Billy Neely, Morgan, Campbell, and the negro Abram, in leaving the stockade and oc- cupying a position covered by a cross-fence, opened fire on the advancing foe; and while thus engaged in keeping back the In- dians, our pioneer mothers kept up a constant fire from the fort, which caused the Indians to believe that the pioneers were in full force, and after many a warrior had been sent to the "happy hunting ground," and many others wounded, they gave up the contest and retreated. History does not record greater heroism than was displayed by the intrepid men and women in this des- perate battle. By their courage and dauntless daring they saved the stockade from being sacked and those in it from a horrible butchery.
To give the reader some idea of the manner in which the In- dians harrassed the early settlers, it may be stated that fion 1780 to 1794, they killed, within seven miles of Nashville, one person in about every ten days. Men, women, and children were slaugh- tered indiscriminately. And this ruthless warfare extended to all the settlements in Middle Tennessee. The Hou. Felix Grundy, who passed amid these perils, once alluded to them in the Senate of the United States, when he spoke with touching eloquence. "I was too young," he said, " to participate in these dangers and difficulties, but I can remember when death was in almost every bush, and every thicket concealed an ambuscade. If I am asked to trace my memory back ard name the first in- delible impression it received, it would be the sight of my eldest brother bleeding and dying under the wounds inflicted by the tomahawk and scalping knife. Another and another went in the same way. I have seen a widowed mother plundered of her whole property in a single night ; from affluence and ease reduced to poverty in a moment, and compelled to labor with her own hands to support and educate her last and favorite son-him who now addresses you. Sir, the ancient sufferings of the West were great. I know it. I need turn to no document to teach me what they were. They are written upon my memory-a part of them upon my heart. Those of us who are here are but the
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