Cass County, Missouri - Reminiscences, Continued, 1917

The writer of this chapter was born in Boone county, Kentucky, September 30, 1836. His father was Hiram Stephens and his mother Harriett Stephens. In 1843 his parents moved to Van Buren (now Cass) county, Missouri, bringing young John, their son, with them. Among the possessions of value brought with them was a bull dog. He was useful to keep the Indians at a proper distance, which he did. Their travel was by steam boat, from Cincinnati, Ohio, down the Ohio, up the Mississippi and Missouri, landing at Lexington, Missouri. The wagon, teams and household goods were shipped on the same boat. Mr. Stephens here tells, his own interesting story:

"At Lexington we met Robert A. Brown who was there with two six mule teams to unload hemp which was a great article of commerce in those days. Brown hauled our outfit to his home near Harrisonville, where we remained for a few days, then moved to Grand River, locating on what is now known as D. W. Duvall's bottom farm. Here we spent the summer of 1843 in a small one room log house. We raised that year the biggest field of corn in the neighborhood, six acres. In the fall of 1843 we moved to the south fork of Grand River on a larger farm, ten acres, with a two-story log house. The house chimney was constructed of sticks daubed with mud. The fireplace was six feet wide. The floor was made of puncheons. There were two doors, a front and back one, one window with one window glass. The doors were made of four foot clapboards ; the stairs was a ladder nailed fast to the wall ; and the upper floor was loose boards. Visitors were cautioned to be careful, lest they would fall through the floor. The lands generally were government land and subject to entry at $1.25 per acre. Some homesteading was done.

People settled at what we now call far apart, as early settlers could not thrive close together. As close as three or four miles, was crowding.

Our near neighbors in 1843, were John Dice, west across the river from the present Grand River Baptist Church. Henry Tull lived east of us across Grand River. It was sport to carry water a half mile from a spring, which most settlers did. Our other neighbors were Andy, Sam, Henry, Hiram and Billy Wilson. They all lived on the road to town - Harrison ville. Next came Perry Prettyman who settled the farm now owned by Frank Taylor. Up the creek was Elijah Jackson. On the south of us, our neighbors were John Pulliam, located at the present L. P. Donaldson homestead. Then came Anderson Harrel, Elias Owens, Brazton Williamson, Jerry Jones and Elisha Buck.

Peter Franse was a young man in those days and in his prowling around found his first wife at Jackson's. Our folks, as well as the rest of the neighbors, were invited to the wedding. We had a fine dinner. All early settler women were good cooks. At this wedding the menu was, a pig roasted whole, wild prairie chickens, venison, wild turkey, with corn hoe cake and biscuits. The officiating preacher was Rev. Joab Powell. When brother Powell reached Grand River from the side oppo¬ site Jackson, he hallowed and he was "set across the river in a canoe". We had no bridges then. As the man paddled the boat and the preacher led his horse by the side of the boat.

The first school was taught by Ben Stephens, uncle of the writer of this sketch. This was in the log cabin, which our family first summered in. Myself and two sisters walked three miles to this school. Of the pupils, who attended this school, myself and two sisters are all that are now living. The others, without exception, have passed to the great beyond, most of them resting in the old church burying ground where our families in later day so often worshiped - located on the old Billy Brady Homestead. The next school taught in the neighborhood was two miles west of the present Wm. H. Steen homestead. This school was taught by a Mr. Carter. Aside from our family the pupils of this school were the children of Rev. John Jackson, Rev. Jeremiah Farmer, the Gard¬ ners and the Keetons, who lived near what is now known as Clark's bridge, over Grand River - then known as Farmer's crossing of Grand River. The names of some of these pupils were Coleman G. Farmer, Thomas B. Farmer, Mary, Louisa and Becka Farmer, Jane, Laura and Anna Jackson, Cole Farmer used to amuse us at the noon hour by preaching to us the sermon his father Jeremiah Farmer preached the preceeding Sunday.

The school furniture consisted of logs split in half with the splinters trimmed olT the top side, holes bored and legs put in them. Half a log was cut out of the side of the school room to let in the light, so we could see to write. The writing desk was a broad slab or board nailed up under the window. We wrote mostly with goose quills, and it was a task for the teacher to keep the quills trimmed.

In 18-48 our family became aristocratic, quit the farm and moved to Harrison ville. We kept hotel on the north side of the square. All the buildings were then frame. The bar room was on the corner where Bar¬ rett Drug Store now is and was run by Bill Taylor and afterwards by Hugh Welden. John Dice used to think Bill Taylor was the same Zachariah Taylor who run for president and was always quite proud of voting for "Old Bill" as he would say.

John Ament had a carpenter shop where the Hotel Harrisonville now stands. I went to school to a man named Westfall in a log house east of where the P. K. Glenn Drug Store now is. Others who attended this school were B. C. Hawkins, Claud and Kelley Hansbrough, Cole and Frank Younger, Lizzie and Meek Walker. I remember being in a charivari when old Mr. Cowers was married to Mrs. Jackson. There was a pile of corn lying in the back yard and while we boys were having a good time John Cummins and John Coughenour had managed to stretch a rope across the street from the northeast corner of the court house square to the corner of the Ament Carpenter Shop. Then went to the pile of corn and began to lambast us with corn. We boys ran when Claud Hansbrough struck the rope, over he fell, the rest of us piling the same way ; when I attempted to rise the whole bunch of boys were upon me.

Bill Coats, a country gentleman, used to come to town periodically and fill up on Bill Taylor's corn juice. John Blazton, Charlie Palmer (son of Amos Palmer) and myself, in our boyish pranks concluded to have some fun out of Bill Coats, so we tied a rope to one of the locust trees along the west side of the square and put the other end through a knot hole in a goods box on the other side of the street and waited for the fun to begin. Bill, in the meantime managed to get some fire-crackers which he had in his coat pocket to exploding. That set him going, as he did not seem to know what was up. Bill was so scared and jumping so high, he cleared our rope and we lost our fun, but a good old man by the name of Dixon came along, struck our rope and fell sprawling on the walk. We all felt mean over this trick. In 1850 our family grew tired of city life and moved back to the farm.

About this time the California gold fever was at its highest. A com¬ pany was formed to go to California. On the 5th day of May, 1850, our company met where the Grand River Baptist Church now stands. Many of our relatives and friends were there to bid us a last farewell, for they never expected to see us again. Starting on that two thousand mile trip with five yoke of oxen to the wagon to a then unknown world, was no small undertaking. We never saw a house after we passed the Missouri State line until we drove into "Old Fort Laramie", located in the present State of Wyoming. Many of us became blue and very homesick. It rained on us for several days after we started. I was good and sick. When out a few days, in the eastern part of the present State of Kansas, then on the edge of the great American desert, at dusk of evening, one of our party killed a fine fat buffalo. This gave us a great feast. This was near the present site of Manhattan. We were now in the Indian country. Every night some of us stood guard over camp. This we had to do to keep the Indians from surprising us and running off our cattle. But a short distance further on buffalo were plentiful and became a nuisance to us in traveling.

On one occasion Dock Stephens (a brother of Mrs. Clarence B. Price, of Harrisonville) and myself, both mere boys, staid around camp after the train had started on its march. We were cooking and eating buffalo meat, when all at once my pony threw up his head and snorted. The prowling Indians began to shoot at us with their bows and arrows. Now to say we mounted the ponies in lightning speed is to put it mildly. We boys escaped harm, yet my pony got an arrow in his thigh. A few days after this we were joined by another train of wagons westward bound.

Everything went well with us, except the intense monotony of travel, until we reached Sweet Water River (in the present State of Wyoming). Here the cholera struck us. Several of those with our train died. We were compelled to wait here until our men could so recuperate as to be able to travel. From here we had mountain climbing and sandy deserts. When we reached the Humbolt River (at a point where it sinks), there was so much alkali in the water, our men were compelled to wade into the lake to get fresh water to drink. When replenished with fresh water which took a couple of days our train strung out to cross the alkali desert. This took us two days and nights; we traveled mostly at night. As we passed over this desert we saw hundreds of carcasses of dead animals which had perished making the same kind of trip we were making. And

The day we reached the mines I found a cousin of my father. He had gone there in 1849. He made me rich, at once, by paying me $100 a month to go to the valley and herd stock for him. During the winter months I acted as dining room boy at a wage of $100 per month. In those days it took a letter a month to come from Missouri to California.

On about the first of December, 1851, several of us started for home. We took sail at San Francisco on the ship "John L. Stephens/' For thirteen days were were out of sight of land and everything else, except sky and water, whales, sharks and sea birds. We landed at San Juan Delmort, near the western outlet of the great Isthmian canal. We crossed over the divide to Graytown. Here we took a steamship to New Orleans. Here we had our gold minted. Then we had plenty of gold money. Our steamer up the Mississipi River could get no farther than "Cape Girard¬ eau", from whence we took sleighs to Boonville, thence by stage to Lexing¬ ton. From Lexington we walked to our homes in Cass County. We reached home about the middle of February, 1852.

Those who started west with our train in 1850 were Atha Tull who died in California, William Tull, Peter Franse, P. E. Franse, Joshua Flynn, Bill Sims, J. O. Holloway, Arch Holloway, Fleming Holloway, Thomas Holloway, Dock Stephens, Hiram Stephens (my father), and Liney Jackson who died in California. Of this company, I am, today, the sole sur¬ vivor. Great has been the change since that day. Many of those I knew and loved have crossed the great divide, to that country from whence no traveler returns. A serious thought comes over me. Were all these I met and knew so well in those days so long ago, ready for their final change. Am I ready to take this trip, which from the very nature of things can not be long delayed.

In these other days oxen were our work animals, the old prairie plow our principal farm tool. Indians were on all sides. I had Indian boy chums of whom I was quite fond. They visited me at my home and I at their camp, which they were accustomed every year to make near our home. I have seen in this county wild deer by the score in a drove. Wolves by the dozens, roaming together. The reader does not get an adequate idea of the plentifulness of wild game, by reading. Game of every kind was everywhere in immense numbers.

history of the county he was called upon to marry a couple. When he arrived the bride was all togged up in her yellow and blue cotton striped dress with a big sun-flower in her hair. The groom was in the yard deeply immersed in a game of marbles. When he was notified all was ready, he yelled out to wait 'til he got that game out. Everything waited on his lordship. When the marble game was completed, he put on his coat and brogan shoes and made his way to the house. You understand all went barefooted except on special occasions. He walked up to the bride, taking her right hand in his left, announcing to the waiting guests, "I am ready, if you are." The ceremony was short. The squire kissed the bride and the bridegroom resumed his game of marbles with the utmost indifference of the occasion. The squire got his twenty-five cent coon skin for the services rendered and wended his way home. Animal skins were legal tender among early settlers. On another occasion the squire received a pet deer for his services. These were more aristocratic people. No license was required in an early day. If the girl said yes on the way from church all the bridegroom, elect, had to do was to get the squire and the necessary coon skin.

Our old plows had wooden mold-boards, harness had chain tugs or trace chains with rope lines. Hay was cut by hand with the scythe and stacked with wooden pitch forks. We planted corn by hand, covered it with a hoe and plowed it both ways by single shovel. We lived mostly on corn bread and wild game. We went to mill on horseback, with a two bushel sack across the horse. The mill was a water mill. When com¬ pany came we sometimes had biscuits. When we wanted to telephone to a neighbor or to town, we sent a negro or boy on horse back to deliver the message. Telephones, automobiles and rural route mails were unknown. The first suit of "store clothes" I ever had was cut out by Cuthbert Mockby, who then lived where C. Kelly and Mrs. D. K. Hall now live. He charged thirty-five cents. He went across the street and bought of Granny Burnet some ginger cake and cider paying 20 cents therefor, thus leaving himself 15 cents ahead on the day's work. Granny Burnet was great on her ginger cakes and cider. We country boys thought we were well to do when we had change enough to visit Granny Burnet's and buy cakes and cider.

I remember of selling my fur catch at West Point on one occasion for $3.30, the same furs would today sell for $50.00. We didn't go by roads then. It was such and such a bridle path. We could travel twenty miles without passing more than two or three houses. When God Almighty created the earth He put a large slice here, intending it to be called Cass County and saved it to be settled in the first instance by Godloving and God-serving people. He imbued them with the highest ideals of honesty and, early, taught them to practice holy virtues.