The morning star and Catholic messenger., 1876-12-17
Il COLORADO HEROINE.

| On - Aiudy uiBuU Ol Ia6G We6B, In one OF
the email parks of Colorado, lying among
the mountains on the North Platte, there
was curious scene. There in a place
nfteen miles away from the nearest neigh
oor sat woman, surrounded by her family
of seven children, and watching the dead
| body of her husband. A large fire which
she and her oldest boy, lad of fourteen,
had built, threw a ehastly glare over the
lonely landscape. The broad sky above
and the huge hills around made more in
tense the sense of desolation and the little
ness of humanity, and the murmur Of the
stream near by and the bark of the fox in
the distance were the only utterapces of
solitude to grief. This woman's stors, as
told IN the Denver Tribune, is one of the
most affecting in the strange annals of
American pioneer adventure. Her hus.
band, w. II. Ostl ON, had come to Cobra
do from Alabama, and on account of the
depredatiops of the grasshoppers bad not
been very PROSPEROUS He bad prepared
new homo for bic family ia park on the
North Platte, and set QUO that Forming
from Pine Grove Gulch for the tourney Of
twenty miles, in a Western wagon drawn
by team Of mules, aud loaded with his
household and household goods. Towards
evening, as he was crossing a small stream
at rough part Of the road one of the mules
shieds and the wagon was overturned. 1t lie
probable that Ostrom was walking beside it,
and flung himself in the way to try and
save his wife and children. They were
thrown violently out and he was caught
under the overturned wagon and borne
to the ground with the cross bar of the
wagon-bed across bim and a weight of
i 500 pounds crushing him. His terrified
wife found him lying in this way, cool and
considerate, but very pale. He directed |
her in her vain efforts to pry the wagon |
over, and died within five minutee, even |
while assuring her that he was not dan
gerously hurt. The oldest boy was on
foot, driving a COW, and came up only in |
time to join his mother in her attempts to |
release his fathers dead body. With true
pioneer readiness and sternness the team
vas unhitched and put to drag off the
wagon, and the corpse was rolled In sheet,
ed, and the widow and orphans sat down
n their dismal bivouac. Even when
ieath comes by slow approaches and with
air warning, where the care of anxious
riends and the comforts of civilized life
mitigate suffering, the loss of a husband
for the afflicted. 1t is a grief
hat no condolences can soften, no wealth
alleviate no companionship render endura-
Die. 1t wonid be useless, therefore, to
iwell upon the terrors of death when it
.truck down the head of family unexpect
IDLY and violently in Colorado wilder
lees, leaving woman and children DESC
ate, with darkness and the desert about
hem We think picture of this night
watch of Mrs. Ostrom would be as charac-
eristIc of great phase of American life as
my scene that the imagination could con-
elve of. In her bitter experience, giving
ls glimpse of the sufferings of the women
# the Western frontier, we have something
o suggest the trials and labors of all that
ardy generation which pushed slowly on
rom the Atlantic to the Mississippi, before
Thom the wilderness receded like the hori-
on. IL is the fault of our time to under
ate the rough virtues of the pioneers, and
orget the value of their achievements. We
re losing sight of the romantic and heroic
spects of their life, in the refinement and
1xuries of our own. Her story should
ring back old memories to those in the
cart of civilization, and teach them what
cGst. 1t was not by epchantment that
le log cabin was changed to the brown
ono maosioD, the homespun dresses to
lks, the emigrant Wagons to family car
ages. The metam orphosis was rapid, but
was the result of the sacrifice and idea
or of ages beaped into few years The
olorad0 woman, sitting all night in her
ournful bivouac, with ber seven children
ound her aud toe corpse of her husband
st outside of the glare of the fire, stlffrn.
G in the fTost-'his peuniess widow
ouslng herself in - NOR ling, taking the
lad body on the wagon and retracing her
cps towards civiljz alton, is as distinct a
pc of American womanhood as the gay p
{ lady that attends church in tuis city .
day. They have different missions; but :
ither of them should forget that they are
tiers. 7