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MORE COUNTY HISTORY„A Lett or from Mr. Mum ford, one of Fgyetta County’s first White Residents.We are indebted to A. F. Crawford, of Maynard, for the following letter from one who was among the first white settlers of the county, and who now at the age of 85 years lives at Lone Rock, Wis. While Mr, Crawfoud was visiting friends in Washington state, he met a son of Mrs- Mumford, who told him of theft1 early residence in this county. Mr. Crawford wrote to Mrs. Mum-ford? and received the following reply1Lone Rock, Wis.Oct. 2nd, 1900. Mr. A. F. Crawford,Maynard, la.Dear Sir:—Your note of the 26th ult. came to hand yesterday and as such old reminiscences are dear to me will gladly answer all questions that I can. As the land was not in the market at the time we lived there cannot very well tell what section we located on. Our son, M, K, is right about the year we moved there, but mistaken in the house we lived in. In the fall of 1841 we left. 111., Hancock county, in company with Royce Oatman, wife and four children. At Dubuque we met Joseph Hewitt, who lived 70 miles from Ft. Atkinson. We arrived at his house the second day. Mr.Oafc-mau soon. left. We stayed till my husband with the help of Mr. Hewitt, Geo. Culver, a young man that was staying at Hewitt's, put up a good comfortable- log house, about four miles from Hewitt’s where my husband thought was a good locality. Broad prairie and find large timber adjoining, good water in abundance, as we were near the head of what was then called Brush Creek and on the south a short distance was a small stream of water that entered into the creek. What was strange about it to us, it ebbed and flowed like the tide; at night full, in the morning almost dry. ' There was quite a hill north of our house and a fine spring of pure water flowed from the bottom on the west side. Not very long after we movod into our house, Mr. Oatman and another man by the name of Moses Sperry, wife and four children came to stay with us till they could build and soon Mr. Sperry’s father, mother, and teamster came. They only made nineteen in one room. They stayed only a short time, but persuaded their son and family to go away. But Oatman stayed till spring and put up the frame of a house on the edge of the prairie, then he ljft.The frame was there when we came away. A man and family of wife, one born it; name of Parks,and three children July, 1843, by the lived near Hewett’s part of the time we were there. They were all the naighbors we had in that direction till we got to Eads Grove, about twenty miles, I was told. The Wilcox settlement, as it was called, consisted of Mr. Wilcox andwifeaud child, two bachelors, named James Beatty and Wra. Oh ear, and a Mr. Gamble lived about a mile from the settlement, which they called nine miles from our place. Mr. G. sold out to a Mr, T. Garden and Atwood, who sold whisky to the Indians anti were murdered by them while wp lived there. A little son of T. Garden four years of age, a son fourteen and a daughter eleven were badly wounded, bnt escaped with their lives. We left in 1844 and never knew where the people all went to. Jf there is anything morp that you would care to know I will cheerfully inform you. Our babe was born in 1843’ in July. Very respectfully,Clarrissa Mumford. ■
Newspaper Details
Arlington News
Arlington, Iowa, US
Thu, Oct 25, 1900
Page 8
Full Page
Clipped by
Thomas R.
DC, USA 19 Mar 2024
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