Hancock County, Illinois - Chapter 2: Pioneers and Pioneer Life, 1880

How did people live in the pioneer days? - is a question which the youth of to-day may well ask. In 1S17, it is said the first steaniboat, the Gen. Pilve, ascended the Mississippi above St. Louis. Previous to that period, all merchandise and provisions, except of home product, had to be brought to Illinois by way of New Orleans, in keel-boats " cordeiled " up the current by strong muscular force, - a trip from the settlements to that city and back, occupying about six months' time; or they had to be conveyed across the mountains from the seaboard cities to Pittsburgh or Wheeling, and floated down the Ohio in " broad-horns." Salt was procured in small quantities from Kanawha and about Shawneetown; but tea, coffee, spices, sugar, and the thousand and one articles which now constitute the food of the inhabitants, were seldom seen ; or if seen, were procured for extreme occasions only, and at great expense, by the wealth}'.

Buckskin moccasins and breeches, and rabbit and coon-skin caps were the common wear of the men ; while wife and children were generally but meagerly enveloped in fabrics made from flax at home, or coarse cottons obtained from abroad at high prices.

The residences of the pioneers were chiefly log cabins; the most primitive ones always built without other tool than an ax, and perhaps an auger, and containing from top to bottom neither nail nor glass: hinges they had to the doors, made of stout timber, and locks in the form of a peg or wooden bar.

The pioneers of Hancock, as of most other sections of the West in those early days, were generally poor men, who sought the country with a view of making homes for themselves and children. Some of them, it may be said, were merely hunters, and came for the purpose of getting away from civilization, and to find plenty of game. These, usually, as neighbors began to settle near, pulled up and went further on. But he who came with a view of locating a permanent home, brought in most cases a family with him, and a meager supply of indispensable utensils and tools, with which to begin life in the wilderness. For very evident reasons, they generally made their homes in or contiguous to timber. Their cabins were to be built, and in the quickest time possible; water without digging was to be found there; and shelter was afforded for such stock as they possessed.

could aftord; a cow or two, and perhaps a yoke of oxen; an ax, a few other simple tools, and the inevitable gnn (rifle generally) constituted the "plunder" with winch many a now and long since independent citizen began life as a pioneer in Hancock county.

Once located, the lirst thing to do was to construct a shelter for liimself and family, in tlie meantime living in the wagon as they had traveled, or under the shelter of a tent. It was the work of but a few days to erect a log cabin, with a clapboard roof and without a floor, into which the family and pi'operty could be stored, safe from storms and wild beasts.

Some came in parties of three or four or more, built tJieir rude dwellings, and perhaps planted a small patch of grain; then returned for their families.

The construction of one of these primitive houses >vould be a curiosity to the denizen of the city now, though to most people throughout the West not verj* remarkable. Many of them have been built and occupied for years - comfortable abodes, too, for intelligent and happy families, - without a nail or a bit of iron in their make-up. Some of the best men our State and county have known - Judges, Governors, Senators, Generals, - have been born and reared in these rude structures. A few of them, now old and dilapidated, and fast approaching their end, like their earliest occupants, are yet to be seen in OTir midst; some, reconstructed, doing duty as smoke-houses, pig-pens or corn-cribs; others standing silent and deserted, in their desolation. Their owners, those that are left of them, have long since transferred their goods and chattels to more costly and pretentious edifices.

The ax has been the principal tool in the path of American civilization. It has always preceded the plow. In preparing the home, it has ever been the pioneer tool in the bauds of thq pioneer man; and with it, and with no other, he can fashion a home not to be despised. AVith it the trees are felled and cut into proper lengths for the hut; with it alone the clapboard roofs can be made; with it the puncheons for a door and the floor. But the tools really needed, though not always attainable, were, first, the ax, then a saw, an auger, a frow, and a drawing-knife. With these, and without many of them, \inder the guidance of a strong will, and wielded by a strong arm, the wilderness. of Illinois has been dotted with happy homes, that would defy the rains of summer and the snows and storms of winter.

But there is another and often a mournful side to the picture of pioneer life. The rains and storms come sometimes before shelter can be provided. Sickness overtakes the pioneer or his family. Away in the wilderness - away from kindred or sympathizing friends - beyond reach of medicines or kindly help - no comforts^ perhaps unsuitable food - the wife, the child - another and another droop and die, and in the gloom and desolation are consigned to their lonely graves. No neighborly hand near to place the sod or strew a flower; no kindly voice to oflTer comfort. It is on this pic- ture of pioneer life that we would ask the reader to drop a tear. Pioneer mother! Sad and disconsolate in thy dreary cabin, thy loved one lying asleep in death before thee, soon to be hid from thy loving embrace and care, to thee we drop a tear to-day. Pioneer FATHER ! the partner of thy joys and sorrows stretched on a bed of pain and sickness, or, perhaps, enveloped in her death shroud; children helpless and needing a mother's kindly care; money gone, crops failing, neighbors far away; a gloomy future before thee, - TO THEE we heave a sigh in this, our day of prosperity and richer enjoyments.

As before stated, the first settlers in this prairie country always selected locations in or near to timber. Gradually, a new comer, disregarding the practice and the advice of his predecessors, would work his way into the prairie a mile or two and erect his cabin. The results emboldened others to follow his example; and now, after forty or fifty years of trial, all that broad tract known of old as the " Hancock Prairie," embracing two-thirds of the county, is enclosed into farms, and the only vacant land in the county is in the timber !

Comparing the settlements of the county as between the eastern and western sides, there is a wide difference observable. In the west, most of the earliest settlers are gone, having " pulled stakes " and removed perhaps to greener pastures. They had settled mostly on the bluff' lands near the river, or on the river shore; and lived by hunting and fishing, and by following river occupations. The broad prairie lying east and south of them was abroad waste, useful only as pastures for deer and other game.

Those on the eastern side of the county came mostly a few years later; and finding the timber and prairie lands more evenly distributed and more convenient for farms, took up lands and settled to stay, and they did; and numbers of them yet remain in the county. Divide it evenly by a north and south line, and the eastern half will count probably two permanent settlers of the period previous to IS40, to the western side's one.

There is another marked difference between the two sections. "While in the eastern part we will see many of the best farms still fenced with the old-fashioned Virginia rail fence, the growth of the forests nearby; in the west side such fences are rarely seen, excepting along or near the river bluffs. The great prairie between, settled and occupied more recently, and since the introduction of pine lumber, is generally enclosed with boards, or with the more recent Osage orange line fence. The latter is largely used; and in connection with the barbed wire, will constitute the fence of the future.

To the lug cabins of the eai-ly days, many pioneers who now occupy fine mansions, with their many modern improvements, look back with a feeling of kindness akin to regret. They remember the happy hours they have passed in them ; the many days and nights of enjoyment amid friends and neighbors, they have lived in these rude and rough, but comfortable homes. To be sure, their exteriors were rough and uninviting, and their interiors anything but ornamentah But there the babes were born and nurtured, perhaps mourned in death. There the holiest of human of aifections were centered, and there tlie ever-changing scenes of lift's drama were enacted. Those only who have had the experience can tell of the comforts and eujoyiuents that may be realized in these rude homes of the West. Let the i.oa cabins of the pioneers be remembered with reverence !