Wabash Township

Wabash Township

In April, 1836, Mr. Joseph "Wilson, afterward County Auditor, selected land near Samuel Grissell, who accompanied him to Fort Wayne, to make the entry. They struck the Wabash at Adam Miller's, went down stream to Henry Miller's, where Bluffton now stands, arriving after dark. Here they met John Conner, carrying the mall - an occurrence familiar to all northward travelers for twenty-five years afterward. The next morning, crossing the river in a canoe, and swimming their horses, they proceeded on their journey. Every where the streams were overflowing, and several times the water ran over their horses' backs. At the St. Mary's river thev left the horses, crossed in a canoe, and walked to the land office. Early in the July following Mr. Wilson brought his family fi;om Champaign County, Ohio. From Joab Ward's they came ma John Brooks', which place they endeavored to reach in one day. Failing in this they were compelled to camp out. They were greatly troubled by the myriads of blood-thirsty mosquitoes that swarmed around them. Having located wife and 6* children upon the load, protected by the "wagon cover, he spent most of the night lying upon a log not far distant, with three or four smoke-tires around him, and bush in hand to fight off the biting, buzzing torments. The next evening they reached Muses Hamilton's, having been two days coming sixteen miles. Sometimes the road was too crooked for their long team, and had to be cut out. In about a week they moved into their own house, and began clearing away the woods around it, " to make it look a little like home," - the first work of every pioneer family. For nearly two months during the following winter all the bread for the family of eight was made by pounding corn in a hominy mortar, sifting out the finest for bread, the next for " mush," while the coarsest was boiled for hominy - a convenient variety, which no mill of later invention can produce from one hopper.