Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1879-05-22
Correspondence of the ,Yorkville Enquirer.
LETTER FROM MISSOURI.

LETTER FROM MISSOURI.
READING, PIKE Co., Mo-, May Is.
I am indebted to some kind friend for the
ENQUIRER, and thinking short letter from
this State would interest many of your read
ers, have concluded to jot down few items
pertaining to matters in this great North
western State
The present prospect for wheat is remarka-
bly fine in this section, and as there was a
large area sown last fall, we reasonably look
for large yield. A large crop Of corn is
Icing planted, stimulated by the great failure
the past year, of that invaluable crop to wes-
tern farmers.
The general health of this country was nev-
er, in my recollection, better.
The past winter was remarkably severe.
The earth, for more than two months, was
covered with snow from sixteen to twenty-five
inches deep. This was an occasion for har-
vesting an unparalleled crop OF ice on the
western rivers. One firm in St. Louis cut
and housed, at the mouth of Salt river, two
miles above the city Of Louisiana, m this
county, 81 500 tons. For six weeks they
gave employment to one hundred and thirty
hands and used an elevator run by steam, ca
pable of hosting out of the river into the
house one hundred and twenty tons per hour.
The ice is first chequered by an ice plough,
drawn by span of mules, in squares of ~
inches, then broken off in slabs thirty feet
long and Aoated to the elevator wheel. Then
it is broken into blocks of the size mentioned.
After the first ten days the ice attained 9
thickness of % inches, thus making cubicai
blocks of that size. During this six weeks q
sentinel walked on the edge of the ice in the
river, back and forth, with a large stick suf'
ficient to prevent ice forming in the space
opened each day, which must be kept open,
so that the floating to the elevator may not
be obstructed. When the thermometer stood
twenty.four degrees below zero, you will con-
clude this was no fancy job, yet one man at
tended to it each night for six weeks, for
which he was paid $500 per night. This ice
is all for the Southern market. One house
on the south bank of Salt river, on the K. h.
track, containing 500 tons, goes to Galveston,
Texas. This same company have three pack.
ise houses, on the Illinois river, that packed
an aggregate of one hundred and twenty
thousand tons the past winter. For use IN
the city of Louisville, several houses of one
thousand tons each were packed. Two years
ago the company above referred to Tiled
their houses on Salt river and held them till
the past season, and during the raging of the
epidemic in the South their crop on hand was
shipped and sold at net profit of $4,000:
Having already written more than l m
tended on cold subject, / will close by add
ing few words on one little warmer. Viz. !:
the negro stampede from the cotton and rice
fields of the South, to the cold prairies OF
Kansas. 1t may, and most probably will,
prove cool affair to them the coming VIM
ter, as it is in many respects worse CLINE Tor
the colored man than Missouri or Illinois.
The negroes of Missouri who are supposed to
be better acquainted with the opportunities
offered in Kansas than their brethren in the
Southern States, manifest but little DISPOSE
ton to- change their homes. They are more
disposed to consolidate their strength in the
woodland counties bordering on the Missis.
sippi river than going vest beyond the Mis-
souri, river in Western Missouri or Kansas. %
With none other than humane feelings to-
wards the unfortunate African race, it seems
to me cruel and inhumane to hold out any
inducement to them to leave the sunny South,
the cline best suited to them, and undergo
the tolls and privations incident to a frontier
settlement in any of the wild prairies of the
West. That Kansas is fine country of land
is admitted, and is settling up with hardy
race of Northern men-a race unacquainted
with the pecnliarities of the African; q race,
too, that has rooted him out of every West
ern State, and he will find to his great dis
com6ture the sad mistake he has made, in
one year after arriving there.
What would all the negroes Of York coun.
ty doif they could, by some interposition of
Providence, be lifted and set down without
cost, three hundred niles west Of Kansas
city, the nearest point at which they can Oh"
tain homesteads, on lands destitute of timber,
where warm cabins, heavy warm clothing,
and plenty of strong nutritious food are in
dispensables when the thermometer drops
to twenty and often to thirty degrees below
zero? THos. M. CARROLL.