Complex sentence: By 1799, seventeen years after they married, Wilkinson left Troy, New York in the dead of winter leading a cow with his wife children and household goods aboard a sledge drawn by a yoke of oxen.
Split into simpler sentences: By 1799, seventeen years after they married, Wilkinson left Troy, New York in the dead of winter leading a cow. His wife, children and household goods were aboard a sledge (wagon) drawn by a yoke of oxen.