Woman On The American Frontier - free ebook by William Worthington Fowler

WOMAN ON THE AMERICAN FRONTIER.

A Valuable and Authentic History By WILLIAM W. FOWLER, M.A....

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PREFACE.

The history of our race is the record mainly of men's achievements, in war, in statecraft and diplomacy. If mention is made of woman it is of queens and intriguing beauties who ruled and schemed for power and riches, and often worked mischief and ruin by their wiles. The story of woman's work in great migrations has been told only in lines and passages where it ought instead to fill volumes. Here and there incidents and anecdotes scattered through a thousand tomes give us glimpses of the wife, t

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CHAPTER I.

WOMAN AS A PIONEER, America's Unnamed Heroines. Maids and Matrons of the " Mayflower ." Woman's Work in Early Days. Devotion and Self-sacrifice. Strange Story of Mrs. Hendee. Face to Face with the Indians. A Mother's Love Triumphant Woman among the Savages. The Massacre of Wyoming. Sufferings of a Forsaken Household. The Patriot Matron and her Children. The Acmé of Heroism. Adventures of an English Traveler. Woman in the Rocky Mountains. A Story of a Lonely Life. Nocturnal Visito

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CHAPTER II.

WOMAN'S WORK IN FLOODS AND STORMS, The Frontier two Centuries ago. The Pioneer Army. The Pilgrim "Mothers." Story of Margaret Winthrop. Danger in the Wilderness. A Reckless Husband and a Watchful Wife. Lost in a Snow-storm. The Beacon-fire at Midnight. Saved by a Woman. Mrs. Noble's Terrible Story. Alone with Famine and Death. A Legend of the Connecticut. What befel the Nash Family. Three Heroic Women. In Flood and Storm. A Tale of the Prairies. A Western Settler and her Fate.

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CHAPTER III.

EARLY PIONEERS.—WOMAN'S ADVENTURES AND HEROISM, In the Maine Wilderness. Voyaging up the Kennebec. The Huntress of the Lakes. Extraordinary Story of Mrs. Trevor. Two Hundred Miles from Civilization. Sleeping in a Birch-bark Canoe. A Fight with Five Savages. A Victorious Heroine. The Trail of a Lost Husband. Only just in Time. A Narrow Escape, Voyaging in an Ice-boat. Snow-bound in a Cave. Fighting for Food. Grappling with a Forest Monster. Mrs. Storey, the Forester. Alida Johnso

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CHAPTER IV.

ON THE INDIAN TRAIL A Block-house Attacked. Wild Pictures of Indian Warfare. Exploits of Mrs. Howe. A Pioneer Woman's Record. Holding the Fort alone. Treacherous "Lo." Witnessing a Husband's Tortures. The Beautiful Victim. Forced to Carry a Mother's Scalp. The Fate of the Glendennings. A Feast and a Massacre. Led into Captivity. Elizabeth Lane's Adventures. In Ambush. Siege of Bryant's Station. Outwitting the Savages. Mrs. Porter's Combat with the Indians. Ghastly Trophies of h

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CHAPTER V.

CAPTIVE SCOUTS—HEROINES OF THE MOHAWK VALLEY, The Poetry of Border Life. Mrs. Mack in her Forest Fort. The Ambush in the Cornfield. The Night-watch at the Port-hole. A Shot in the Dark. The Hiding Place of her Little Ones. A Sad Discovery. An Avenger on the Track. Massy Herbeson's Strange Story. On the Trail. Miss Washburn and the Scouts. An Extraordinary Rencontre . A Wild Fight with the Savages. Mysterious Aid. Passing through an Indian Village. Hairbreadth Escapes. Courageous

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CHAPTER VI.

PATRIOT WOMEN OF THE REVOLUTION Times that Tried Men's Souls. The Women of Wyoming. Silas Deane's Sister. Mrs. Corbin, the Cannoneer. A Heroine on the Gun-deck. The Schoharie Girl. Women of the Mohawk Wars. Concerning a Curious Siege. The Patriot Daughter and the Bloody Scouts. What she Dared him to do. Brave Deeds of Mary Ledyard. Ministering Angels. Heroism of "Mother Bailey." Petticoats and Cartridges. A Thrilling Incident of Valley Forge. Ready-witted Ladies. Miss Geiger, th

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CHAPTER VII.

GOING WEST.—PERILS BY THE WAY, After the Revolution. Starting for the Mississippi. Curious Methods of Migration. A Modern Exodus. Incidents on the Route. Wonderful Story of Mrs. Jameson. Forsaking all for Love. A Woman with One Idea. That Fatal Stream. Alone in the Wilderness. A Glimpse of the Enemy. Strength of a Mother's Love, Saved from a Rattlesnake. Individual Enterprise. Migrating in a Flat-boat. A Night of Peril on the Ohio River. Terrifying Sounds and Sights. A Fiery Sc

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CHAPTER VIII.

HOME LIFE IN THE BACKWOODS, The Nomads of the West. Romance of a Pioneer's March. How the Cabin was Built. Where Mrs. Graves Concealed her Babes. Husband and Wife at Home. Rather Rough Furniture. Forest Fortresses. Fighting for her Children. Mrs. Fulsom and the Ambushed Savage. Domestic Life on the Border. From a Wedding to a Funeral. Among the Beasts and Savages. Little Ones in the Wilds. Woman takes Care of Herself. Ann Bush's Sorrows. The Bright Side of the Picture. Western H

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CHAPTER IX.

SOME REMARKABLE WOMEN, Diary of a Heroine. The Border Maid, Wife, Mother, and Widow. Strange Vicissitudes in the Life of Mrs. W. Adopted by an Indian Tribe. Shrewd Plan of Escape. The Hiding-place in the Glen. Surprised and Surrounded, but Safe. Successful Issue of her Enterprise. Mrs. Marliss and her Strategy. Combing the Wool over a Savage's Eyes. Marking the Trail. A Captive's Cunning Devices. A Pursuit and a Rescue. Extraordinary Presence of Mind. A Robber captured by a Woman.

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CHAPTER X.

A ROMANCE OF THE BORDER, The Honeymoon in the Mountains. United in Life and in Death. A Devoted Lover. Capture of Two Young Ladies. Discovery and Rescue. The Captain and the Maid at the Mill. The Chase Family in Trouble. The Romance of a Young Girl's Life. Danger in the Wind. Hunter and Lover. Treacherous Savages. Old Chase Knocked Over. The Fight on the Plains. An Unexpected Meeting. Heroism of La Bonte. The Guard of Love. The Marriage of Mary. Miss Rouse and her Lover. A Bri

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CHAPTER XI

PATHETIC SCENES OF PIONEER LIFE, Grief in the Pioneer's Home. Graves in the Wilderness. The Returned Captive and the Nursery Song. The Lost Child of Wyoming Little Frances and her Indian Captors. Parted For Ever. Discovery of the Lost One. An Affecting Interview. Striking Story of the Kansas War. The Prairie on Fire. Mother and Children Alone. Homeless and Helpless. Solitude, Famine, and Cold. Three Fearful Days. The Burning Cabin. A Gathering Storm. A Dream of Home and Happines

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CHAPTER XII.

THE HEROINES OF THE SOUTH WEST, Texas and the South West. Across the "Staked Plain." Mrs. Drayton and Mrs. Benham. A Perilous Journey. Sunstrokes and Reptiles. Death From Thirst Mexican Bandits. A Night Gallop to the Rendezvous. Escape of our Heroines. A Ride for Life. Saving Husband and Children. Surrounded by Brigands on the Pecos. Heroism of Mrs. Benham. The Treacherous Envoy. The Gold Hunters of Arizona. Mrs. D. and her Dearly Bought Treasure. Battling for Life in the Califo

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CHAPTER XIII.

WOMAN'S EXPERIENCE ON THE NORTHERN BORDER, March of the "Grand Army" Peculiar Perils of the Northern Border. Mrs. Dalton's Record. A Dangerous Expedition. Her Husband's Fate. A Trance of Grief. Between Frost and Fire. A Choice of Deaths. Rescued from the Flames. One Sunny Hour. The Storm-Fiend. Terrific Spectacle. In the Whirlwind's Track. The Only Refuge. Locked in a Dungeon. A Fight for Deliverance. Arrival of Friends. Another Peril. Walled in by Flames. Passing Through a F

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CHAPTER XIV.

ENCOUNTERS WITH WILD BEASTS—COURAGE AND DARING, Personal Combat with a Bear. The Huntress of the Northwest. An Intrepid Wife and her Assailant. Combat with an Enraged Moose. A Bloody Circus in the Snow. Trapping Wolves—a Georgia Girl's Pluck. A Kentucky Girl's Adventure. A Wild Pack in Pursuit. The Snapping of a Black Wolf's Jaws. Female Strategy and its Success. A Cabin Full of Wolves. Comical Denouement. A Young Lady Treed by a Bear. Some of Mrs. Dagget's Exploits. Up the Platte

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CHAPTER XV.

ACROSS THE CONTINENT.—ON THE PLAINS, Voyaging in a Prairie Schooner. A Cavalry Officer's Story. The Homeless Wanderer of the Plains. Mrs. N. Battling alone with Death. A Fatherless and Childless Home. The Plagues of Egypt. Murrain, Grasshoppers, and Famine. Following a Forlorn Hope. A Bridal Tour and its Ending. On the Borders of the Great Desert. An Extraordinary Experience. Women Living in Caves. A Waterspout and its Consequences. Drowning in a Drought. Fleeing from Death. A Wo

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CHAPTER XVI.

WOMAN AS A MISSIONARY TO THE INDIANS, The Heroine and Martyr among the Heathen. Mrs. Eliot and her Tawny Protegés. Five Thousand Praying Indians. Mrs. Kirkland among the Oneidas. Prayer-meetings in Wigwams. The Psalm-singing Squaws. A Revolutionary Matron and her Story. A Pioneer Sunday-school and its Teacher. The Last of the Mohegans and their Benefactors. Heroism of the Moravian Sisters. The Guardians of the Pennsylvania Frontier. A Gathering Storm. Prayer-meetings and Massacres.

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CHAPTER XVII.

WOMAN AS A MISSIONARY TO THE INDIANS, (CONTINUED), Missionary Wives Crossing the Rocky Mountains. Buried Alive in the Snow. Shooting the Rapids in a Birch Canoe. Sucked Down by a Whirlpool. A Fearful Situation and its Issue. A Brace of Heroines and their Expedition. Women Doubling Cape Horn. A Parting Hymn and Long Farewell. A Missionary Wife's Experience in Oregon. All Alone with the Wolves. A Woman's Instinct in the Hour of Danger. Dr. White's Dilemma and its Solution. A Clean Pai

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CHAPTER XVIII.

WOMAN IN THE ARMY, The Daughter of the Regiment. A Loving Wife and a True Patriot. Mrs. Warner in the Canadian Campaign. The Disguised Couriers. Deborah Samson in Buff and Blue. A Woman in Love with a Woman. A Wound in Front and what it Led to. Mrs. Coolidge's Campaign in New Mexico. Bearing Dispatches Across the Plains. A Fight with Guerillas. A Race for Life. Two against Five. Frontier Women in our Last Great War. Their Exploits and Devotion. Miss Wellman as Soldier and Nurse.

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CHAPTER XIX.

ACROSS THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS, A Woman's Adventures on the Platte River. On a False Trail, and What it Led To. Over a Precipice, and Down a Thousand Feet. All Alone on the Face of the Mountain. Mrs. Hinman's Extraordinary Situation. Swinging Between Heaven and Earth. What a Loving Wife Will Do. Living or Dying Beside her Husband. A Night on the Edge of a Precipice. Out of the Jaws of Death. The Two Fugitive Women of the Chapparel. A Secret Too Dreadful to be Told. The Specters of the M

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CHAPTER XX.

THE COMFORTER AND THE GUARDIAN, The Ruined Home and its Heroine. The Angel of the Sierra Nevada. Mrs. Maurice and the Dying Miners. The Music of a Woman's Word. The Young Gold Hunter and his Nurse. Starving Camp in Idaho. The Song in the Ears of the Dying. The Seven Miners and their Golden Gift. A Graveyard of Pioneer Women. Mrs. R. and her Wounded Husband. The Guardian Mother of the Island. The Female Navigator and the Pirate. A Life-boat Manned by a Girl. A Night of Peril. A Den

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CHAPTER XXI.

WOMAN AS AN EDUCATOR ON THE FRONTIER, A Mother of Soldiers and Statesmen. A Home-school on the Border. The Prairie Mother and her Four Children. A Garden for Human Plants and Flowers. The First Lesson of the Boy and Girl on the Frontier. The Wife's School in the Heart of the Rocky Mountains. A Leaf from the Life of Washington. The Hero-Mothers of the Republic. A Patriot Woman and a Martyr. A Mother's Influence on the Life of Andrew Jackson. Woman's Discernment of a Boy's Genius. West

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CHAPTER I.

Every battle has its unnamed heroes. The common soldier enters the stormed fortress and, falling in the breach which his valor has made, sleeps in a nameless grave. The subaltern whose surname is scarcely heard beyond the roll-call on parade, bears the colors of his company where the fight is hottest. And the corporal who heads his file in the final charge, is forgotten in the "earthquake shout" of the victory which he has helped to win. The victory may be due as much, or more, to the patriot co

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CHAPTER II.

The American Frontier has for more than two centuries been a vague and variable term. In 1620-21 it was a line of forest which bounded the infant colony at Plymouth, a few scattered settlements on the James River, in Virginia, and the stockade on Manhattan Island, where Holland had established a trading-post destined to become one day the great commercial city of the continent. Seventy years later, in 1690, the frontier-line had become greatly extended. In New England it was the forest which sti

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CHAPTER III.

For nearly one hundred years after the settlement of Plymouth, the whole of the territory now known as the State of Maine was, with the exception of a few settlements on the coast and rivers, a howling wilderness. From the sea to Canada extended a vast forest, intersected with rapid streams and dotted with numerous lakes. While the larger number of settlers were disinclined to attempt to penetrate this trackless waste, some few hardy pioneers dared to advance far into the unknown land, tempted b

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CHAPTER IV.

The axe and the gun, the one to conquer the forces of wild nature, the other to battle against savage man and beast—these were the twin weapons that the pioneer always kept beside him, whether on the march or during a halt. In defensive warfare the axe was scarcely less potent than the gun, for with its keen edge the great logs were hewed which formed the block-house, and the tall saplings shaped, which were driven into the earth to make the stockade. We know too that woman could handle the gun

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CHAPTER V.

The part that woman has taken in so many ways and under so many conditions, in securing the ultimate results represented by our present status as a nation, is given too small a place in the general estimate of those who pen the record of civilization on the North American continent. This is no doubt partly due to her own distaste for notoriety. While man stands as a front figure in the temple of fame, and celebrates his own deeds with pen and voice, she takes her place in the background, content

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CHAPTER VI.

During the dangers and trials of early colonial life, the daughters learned from the example of their mothers the lesson and the power of self-trust; they learned to endure what their parents endured, to face the perils which environed the settlement or the household, and grew up to woman's estate versed in that knowledge and experience of border-life which well fitted them to repeat, in wilder and more perilous scenes, the heroism of their forefathers and foremothers. The daughters again taught

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CHAPTER VII.

In regarding or in enjoying an end already accomplished by others, we are too apt to pass by the means through which that end was reached. America of to-day represents a grand result. We see that our land is great, rich, and powerful; we see that the flag waves from ocean to ocean, over a people furnished with all the appliances of civilization, and happy in their enjoyment; we are conscious that all this has come from the toils and the sufferings of many men and of many women who have lived and

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CHAPTER VIII.

The first stage in pioneer-life is nomadic: a half-score of men, women, and children faring on day after day, living in the open air, encamping at night beside a spring or brook, under the canopy of the forest, it is only when they reach their place of destination, that the germ of a community fixes itself to the soil, and rises obedient to those laws of social and civil order which distinguish the European colonist from the Asiatic nomad. The experiences of camp life form the initial steps to t

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CHAPTER IX.

Of all the tens of thousands of devoted women who have accompanied the grand army of pioneers into the wilderness, not one but that has been either a soldier to fight, or a laborer to toil, or a ministering angel to soothe the pains and relieve the sore wants of her companions. Not seldom has she acted worthily in all these several capacities, fighting, toiling, and ministering by turns. If a diary of the events of their pioneer-lives had been kept by each of these brave and faithful women, what

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CHAPTER X.

The romance of border-life is inseparably associated with woman, being her natural attendant during her wanderings through the wilderness. A distinguished American orator has suggested that a series of novels might be written founded upon the true stories of the border-women of our country. Such a contribution to our literature has thus far been made only to a limited extent. The reason for this deficiency will be obvious on a moment's reflection. The true stories of the pioneer wives and mother

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CHAPTER XI.

A hundred ills brood over the cabin in the wilderness. Some are ever-present; others lie in wait, and start forth at intervals. Labor, Solitude, Fear; these are the companions of woman on the border: to these come other visitants—weariness, and that longing, yearning, pining of the heart which the Germans so beautifully term sehn-sucht —hunger, vigils, bodily pain and sickness, the biting cold, the drenching storm, the fierce heat, with savage eyes of man and beast glaring from the thicket. Then

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CHAPTER XII.

No portion of our country has been the scene of more romantic and dangerous adventures than that region described under the broad and vague term the "Southwest." Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona, are vast, remote, and varied fields with which danger and hardship, wonder and mystery are ever associated. The country itself embraces great contrarieties of scenery and topography—the rich farm, the expansive cattle ranch, the broad lonely prairie watered by majestic rivers, the barren desert, the lofty

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CHAPTER XIII.

The vanguard of the "Great Army" which for nearly three centuries has been hewing its pathway across the continent, may be divided into certain corps d'armée , each of which moves on a different line, thus acting on the Napoleonic tactics, and subjugating in detail the various regions through which it passes. One corps, spreading out in broad battalions, marches across the great prairies and winding through the gorges of the Rocky mountains, encamps on the shore of Peaceful sea: another, skirtin

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CHAPTER XIV.

The inhabitants of the frontier from the earliest times have had to face the fiercest and most ravenous wild beasts which prowl in the forests of this continent; and the local histories of the various sections and single settlements on our border-land abound in thrilling accounts of combats between those pests of the forest and individual men and women. Wolves, like the poor, were always with the frontiersmen. Bears, both black and brown, were familiar visitors. The cougar, American lion, catamo

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CHAPTER XV.

The movement of emigration westward since the early part of the seventeenth century resembles the great ocean billows during a rising tide. Sweeping over the watery waste with a steady roll, dragged by the lunar force, each billow dashes higher and higher on the beach, until the attractive influence has been spent and the final limit reached. The spirit of religious liberty and of adventure carried the European across the Atlantic. This was the first wave of emigration. The achievement of our In

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CHAPTER XVI.

"How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings: that publisheth peace: that bringeth good tidings of good: that publisheth salvation." Among the faithful messengers who have borne this Gospel of peace to the benighted red man, there have been many devoted and pious women. The story of woman as a missionary in all climes and countries contains in itself the elements of the moral-sublime. History has not recorded,—poetry itself has seldom portrayed more affecting

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CHAPTER XVII.

Of all that devout and heroic bands of men and women who have undertaken to bear the hardships and face the dangers of our American wilderness, for the special purpose of carrying the Gospel of peace, love, and brotherhood to the benighted denizen of our American forests, none have exhibited more signal courage, patience, and devotion than the companies which first selected Oregon as their special field of labor. In order to properly estimate the appliances and dangers of this enterprise, the Or

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CHAPTER XVIII.

In the great wars of American history, there are, in immediate connection with the army, two situations in which woman more prominently appears: the former is where, in her proper person, she accompanies the army as a vivandiere , or as the daughter of the regiment, or as the comrade and help-meet of her husband; the latter, and less frequent capacity, is that of a soldier, matching in the ranks and facing the foe in the hour of danger. During the war for Independence a large number of brave and

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CHAPTER XIX.

The frontier of to-day is on the plains and in the mountains. In that immense territory bounded by the Pacific on the west, and on the east by a line running irregularly from the sources of the Red River of the North to the Platte, one hundred miles from Omaha, and thence to the mouth of the Brazos in Texas, wherever a settlement is isolated, there is the frontier. Life in these remote regions is affected, of course, by external surroundings. The same is true of the passage of the pioneer battal

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CHAPTER XX.

Mind-power and heart-power—these are the forces that move the moral universe. Which is the stronger, who shall say? If the former is within the province of the man, the latter is still more exclusively the prerogative of woman. With this she wins and rules her empire, with this she celebrates her noblest triumphs, and proves herself to be the God-delegated consoler and comforter of mankind. This is the power which moves the will to deeds of charity and mercy, which awakens the latent sympathies

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CHAPTER XXI.

"Within the house, within the family the woman is all: she is the inspiring, moulding, embellishing, and controlling power." This terse description of woman's influence in the household applies with double force and significance to the position of the pioneer wife and mother. Her life in that position was one long battle, one long labor, one long trial, one long sorrow. Out of this varied, searching, continuous educational process came discipline of the body, of the mind, and of the whole moral

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