Wayne County, Indiana - Chapter 2: Pioneer Life a Century Ago, 1912

Chapter 2: Pioneer Life a Century Ago

REVOLUTIONARY EPOCH - IM MIGRATION - CLOTHING OF THE PIONEERS - EARLY HABITATIONS - FARMING TOOLS - THE WHIPSAW - DYEING OF CLOTH - THE ROPE WALK- - - AMUSEMENTS OF THE PIONEERS.

The close of the Revolutionary war marked an epoch in the country's onward march to the great destiny laid out for it. When the excitement attending these momentous events had, in a measure, subsided, there were hundreds of old heroes who found themselves without any property or occupation and no prospect of bettering their conditions. There was no money but the worthless Continental Scrip. Many of these old heroes were maimed for life and still more were broken down by disease. Most of them were unable to do anything and could but remain in the section of their former homes. But the strong and hardy ones, by hundreds, determined to better their condition, if possible. The fame of Daniel Boone and other frontiersmen was known to them, and glowing descriptions of the rich country west of the mountains and north of the Ohio river were told by hunters and trappers and by the returning soldiers, who, under the leadership of George Rogers Clark, had saved to the weak, young republic the princely heritage of the Northwest Territory: There was a great uprising of the people nearest the much-talked-of country west of the mountains and they started in "every conceivable manner - some on horseback, some in two-wheeled carts, and a large number on foot. These were the forerunners of civilization who settled along the Ohio river. The pioneers met with a determined opposition from the Indians, but gradually, treaties were made whereby territory was made secure. The pioneers had been compelled to build strong forts in every section where they attempted to form settlements and spend much of their time within the walls of the stockades that surrounded the block houses. In many cases, they suffered for want of food, not daring to go into the forests for game. When the pioneers found that the Indians were gone, they would kill buffalo, bear, deer and turkeys, storing away large quantities of the provisions in their block houses. These men had come with a determination to stay and make a home for themselves and families. They took every precaution for protection against the Indians and they endured the most trying privation to succeed.

Gradually, more people came, thus, making the settlement stronger, and soon, small tracts of land were cleared. Often one mati was concealed and on the watch with his rifle, while another cleared a small field that was put in corn and vegetables, and this was cultivated in the best way possible. In 1800 Indiana Territory was organized by an act of Congress and this gave a further impetus to permanent settlement. Soon after the settlements began to push out from the Ohio river, and early in the century, one was established near where the city of Richmond now stands. The pioneers who first came to Indiana could not have remained any length of time had it not been for the game which was so abundant on every hand. They often had no other food than the bear, deer and turkey meat. They used various substitutes for bread - often roasting the white oak acorns and eating them with their meat. They would gather the seeds of the wild rice and wild barley, mixing them with the roasted acorns, pounding them all together and making ash cakes of the meal thus obtained. On such food as this, the old pioneers and their families subsisted until they could raise a patch of corn.

The clothing of the men and boys was in keeping with their daily life. Well dressed deer skins made comfortable and serviceable shirts, leggings and coats. Sometimes, the buffalo skins were sheared and the shaggy wool mixed with a small portion of the wild nettle fiber, which was carded and spun the same as sheep's wool.

In most cases the first settlers were young men who, with their wives, their axes and their rifles, and such other property as they possessed, came boldly into this then dense wilderness. They cut the logs for their cabins and covered it with boards made with their axes. Cracks between the logs were filled by wedging in pieces of timber and then filling with mud. A hole of the proper size was cut in the side for a door, and often the only door shutter was a bear skin. The floor and carpet were of mother earth. For a bedstead they might drive a fork into the: ground far enough from the side and end of the cabin; then put a pole in the fork and into a crack between the logs and another pole the other way, thus making the end and side rails of the bedstead. This would then be covered with fine brush and the skins of animals. Later on the beautiful blue figured coverlids, made by the good mothers in the South, began to make their appearance. The table was made in much the same way as the bed.

These brave people had few of the comforts of life, as we think of them, but they were rich in health, determination and pluck. With their axes they cleared the forests and with their rifles they obtained the choicest of meats and the skins of animals, which were soon exchanged for other necessities of life. The pioneer knew little and probably cared less for what was going on in the outside world. He had severed all connections with his old home and the outside world, bidding adieu to all the early associations. The main object in coming to this wild region was to secure free land for homes. Settling a new country is always attended with great hardships and privations, which none but the brave will endure. The spirit of adventure caused a few to come, but as a whole the people who were the pioneers of this State were from the very best families, intelligent, brave, hardy and honest, willing to endure the many trials and privations they were compelled to, to sustain themselves. They went to work to improve their surroundings - always on the outlook for dangers and the everlasting calm only broken by the croaking of the crows by day and the lonesome hoot of the owls by night. The early settlers, as a rule, married when they were young. There was no inequality in the way, for all were on the same level. If the young man was a good hunter and a good soldier if need be, those were all the requirements needed. The young woman was usually industrious and healthy and had learned from her mother the simple forms of housekeeping. After the wedding the first thing to do was to build a house, and after a favorable site had been selected, all the neighbors helped in cutting and hauling logs. And one who was given to idleness was looked upon with contempt. In fact there was no place for the idler.

Very early, schools were established. Although the terms were short and they were supported by private subscriptions, yet they gave the first principles of education.

The dress of these people was suitable for the life they had to lead. The women did not have as elaborate costumes as the men, but they dressed at all times to suit their work and the weather, providing they had the material with which to make their clothing. The linsey skirt was very common. They made shawls and blankets of flannel. It was often very difficult to secure the raw mate-

I2 Memoirs Of Wayne County

In the pioneer days the early settlers had to depend upon their own resources for such farming tools as they needed. They made a very serviceable plow with a wooden moldboard, which was made of the best hard wood obtainable. They made a very serviceable harrow entirely of wood. The horse collars were made mostly of corn shucks plaited in large rope-like sections, and sewed together hard and fast with leather thongs. They also made collars of raw hide, cutting it in proper shape and sewing the edges together, stuffing it on the inside to make it hold its shape. The bridle was made of raw hide. Hames were made from the lower part of a tree, including a part of the root for the proper crook. A wagon that was termed a truck was made from cutting four large wheels from a large tree, usually a black gum. Oxen were the usual teams that were hitched to these crude but serviceable wagons. A heavy wooden yoke went on the oxen's neck. The pitch forks for all purposes on the farm were made of wood and wooden rakes were made of strong, seasoned wood. A spade was made of seasoned hickory.

Cooking utensils were few, as they were expensive, and it was with difficulty that they were moved across the mountains. Cooking stoves were few before 1820.

Among the early important industries of the State were the milling industry, the flax industry, and the loom and whip saw. As the country developed each well-ordered family had its flax brake, its scutching board, its hackle, its distaff, its wheels and its reel.

When the whipsaw was introduced and put to work, it was a great help to the new-comer in securing material to finish his log house more comfortably and in supplying lumber for out buildings. The whipsaw was a very simple affair. In shape it was much the same as the common crosscut saw of to-day. The teeth were so constructed and filed that it would cut the timber the long way - the log being placed on a scaffold. The process was a slow one, but as no one wanted a very large amount of lumber, two men could soon saw from the soft timber a sufficient amount for all needs.

, The dyeing of cloth was also a very interesting home occupation. The walnut bark and the hulls of the walnut made a very serviceable brown. Maple bark, mixed with copperas, made a very dark color. Indigo and madder combined made a very pretty blue. Still later logwood and many other kinds of dye were used up to the time when the clothing was purchased from the store. But these old days with the stained hands of our mothers have gone never to return.

No _ better illustration of the advance of civilization could be given than that shown in the development of agricultural and other implements. The wagon was made after the rudest fashion with the proverbial log chain looped around the front axle tree, the other end hooked on to the side of the wagon, so as to be ready for locking the hind wheel when going down steep hills. This was long before rub locks had been thought of. The wooden moldboard plows early gave way to cast iron ones. Often in the absence of a harrow, a lot of coarse brush was chained together and used to pulverize the clods and smooth the ground. Corn was dropped by hand and covered with hoes, and wheat was scattered over the ground a handful at a time. The sickle was the imple-. ment used in reaping the grain. This was later followed by the grain cradle, which made its appearance in this region about 18 40. Their crops were protected by fences made of rails cut out of oak, ash, hickory, poplar and walnut timber. The splitting of large logs into rails required skill, great physical strength and endurance. Another interesting implement was the "rope walk," an apparatus for making bed-cords, clothes lines, plow lines, halters, etc. A level piece of ground was selected about 200 feet long. A heavy slab was put in the ground at each end of the place selected about five feet in height and twelve inches broad. A two-inch augur hole was made in the center of each slab about ten inches from the bottom. Into these holes were put pins with a shoulder on the outside end and a key to hold them in place on the inside. To this pin a round wheel about eight inches broad was fastened with a pin for a handle, placed in the hole made for the purpose on the outside edge of the wheel. Along the walk about twenty feet apart smooth posts were set on each side about four feet from the center with a number of pegs driven on the side facing the walk. Along the center of the walk, every twenty-five or thirty-five feet, a slab was driven into the ground, standing about three feet high, with a notch cut in the top end and made perfectly smooth. A bunch of tow was fastened to the pin that the wheel was on, and the wheel was turned. One held the bunch of tow under his arm, using his hands to even the string as it was twisted, and as he passed the low post, put the cord in the notch on top of it, and when he had gone the length of the walk, he tied the string to the end of the other wheel and turned it until the string was twisted as hard as wanted. In the home the broad open fire place with the crane hanging against the back wall, the skillet, the oven, the longhandled frying pan and the reflector were familiar to the pioneer and they suggest to our minds the hot biscuits, the sweet pone, the corn dodger and the apple dumplings which we have heard so much

In a room not otherwise occupied or in an adjoining buildin stood the old-fashioned loom, on which the mother taught her daughter to weave carpet, linen and linsey. I suppose the loom occupied much the same place in the house of the pioneer that the piano does today, although the spinning wheel probably made more music.

The following description of pioneer times was given by Mrs. Rebecca Julian, of Centerville, in 1854, and is of interest because it is first hand, given by an eye witness:

"There were many serious trials in the beginning of this country with those who settled amid the heavy timber, having nothing to depend upon but their own industry. Such was our situation. However, we were blessed with health and strength and were enabled to accomplish all that was to be done. Our husbands cleared the ground and assisted each other in rolling the logs. We often went with them on these occasions to assist in cooking for the hands. We had firstrate times - just as hard laboring men and women can appreciate. We were not what would now be called fashionable cooks. We had no pound cakes, preserves nor jellies, but the substantials prepared were in plain, honest, old-fashioned style. This is one reason why we were so blessed in health. We had none of your dainties - knicknacks and many fixings that are worse than nothing. There are many diseases now that were not heard of thirty or forty years ago. It was not fashionable at that time to be weakly. We could take our spinning wheels and walk 'two miles to a spinning frolic, do our day's work and, after a firstrate supper, join in some interesting amusement for the evening. We did not take particular pains to keep our hands white. We knew they were made to use to our advantage, therefore, we never thought of having hands just to look at. An early settler had to go and assist his neighbor ten or fifteen days or thereabout in order

While the women were thus enjoying social life at a spinning frolic, the men might have been enjoying all the pleasures of a corn husking. Then the corn heap being equally divided and a. captain and the men on each side selected, the party who first finished their portion of the heap carried their captain in triumph on their shoulders into the ranks of the opposition. And then there was the sewing match or quilting party in which the women, participated during the day, and after their day's work was finished, their husbands and the neighboring young men joined them at the house and spent the evening in playing games or dancing an. old-fashioned reel.

Witchcraft was not unknown in the early history of Indiana. and one of our Territorial laws dealt with the crime of dueling. By 1816,.when Indiana was admitted into the Union as a State, the population did not exceed probably about 70,000, but the tide of immigration had set in, so that by 1820, the population amounted to almost 150,000. The inhabitants of the new State began to open new farms, to found new settlements, to plant new orchards, to erect school-houses and churches, to build hamlets. and towns and to engage, with some degree of ardor, in various peaceful pursuits of civilized life. A sense of security pervaded the minds of the people - the hostile Indian tribes, having been overpowered, humbled and impoverished, no longer incited the fears of the pioneer settlers who dwelt in safety in their plain log cabins. and cultivated their fields without the protection of armed sentinels. The numerous temporary forts and block houses which were no longer required as places of refuge for the pioneers were. either converted into dwelling houses or suffered to fall into ruins.

The State was in its infancy; its resources were undeveloped ;. its citizens were not wealthy, but the seed had been sown which was to ripen into a great industrial State which became a refuge for members of all the leading religious organizations and which, by both public and private acts, has developed one of the leading educational systems of the world.