Rock Island Argus., 1902-11-25


sense. i want to tell you that this
winter is ethereal mildness compared
with a winter we had in old times.
Old settlers brag! Not bit of brag
about it. What 1 tell you is a fact
1.-The speaker was ID. p. McKown,
the secretary of the Scott County Pio-
neers' association, who lived in
Davenport nearly nfty years.
1T was the winter of 1S42-43, and
know all about it, for l was in fix
that made it almost uncomfortable, and
| counted every one of its tedious
days, looking for let up every hour
| which never came until after six long
months had passed. Talk about cold
weather hanging on-why, if this re-
gion had been as thicl<ly populated
then as it is now many people would
have perished. 1t was the coldest
winter ever known in this Mississippi
valley by white men. l will tell you
how it was with me, and you will see
why my memory of it is so clear
And Mr.. MckOwn entered upon n
graphic story of his experience in
that historic winter of 1S42-43.
"'A. c. Fulton was then. as he is
now, though As years older, one of
the most enterprising men in Daven-
port. He had large fiatboat built in
October, 1912, by carpenter named
| Charlie Anderson, who named the
boat Eliza in honor of young lady
in the village to whom he was engag-
ed In November Mr.. Fulton loaded
that boat with onions and potatoes
and intended the cargo for the New
| Orleans market. The crew consisted
of Capt. John Anderson, Charlie An
| derson (no relation to each other),
John McCloskey, man named King,
and myself. The cargo and boat cost
Mr.. Fulton S1,S00. We set sail from
! Davenport on the nth of November,
with beautiful weather prevailing.
! Next day it became cool. The water
was low, and it was hard boating, l
| tell you, for ice was forming fast.
| The third day we tied up at Otter ISL
and, five miles above Burlington, to
wait for thaw. 1t was frightfully
| cold-away below Zero-and the river
was soon solid ice. Well, sir, we stay
ed there all winter. We lived on
onions and pork-took along pork as
part of our provisions. All the drink
we had besides water was a decoction
| from sarsaparilla root which was dug
from under the snow-and ii thinned
our blood so that il almost killed us.
! The man who owned Otter island hir-
| ed us to chop cord wood at 37% cents
per day and take it i'm orders on n
store in burlington. Money was very
scarce. We could get no groceries
sugar, tea. coffee, flour, and the like
-nnthInO hIf cnrnmR1l whisky
powder and dry goods. The only fiouI
we had was 10 pounds which our en-
ployer had bought us FOR Christmas
! dinner. Oh, that was a dinner! The
Sunday before Christmas the boys
shot a wild turkey, couple of pheas-
ants and three or four hares. There
! was no finer dinner in the land. We
had plenty of good whisky. 1t was
| jolly day.
but you have forgotten the tenn
perature, Mr.. McKown. How. cold
was it"
lone of us used to go down to
Burlington every little while. There
was a thermometer outside a store
there, and it used to register % to %
degrees below zero. Day after day,
week after week, the mercury was
that low. Everybody said it was the
coldest winter ever known here. L
know myself there has been nothing
like it since. | forgot to tell you one
| discovery we made. We found two
] bee trees. One was four feet in di-
ameter, but there wasn't pound of
! honey in it. The other was Is inches
in diameter, sycamore. and we took
20 pounds of honey from that tree.
How about the breakup? Well, sir,
there was no breakup until the mid
die of April. We didn't get away
from the island until the 25th of
/ April. Why, on the 18th of April the
ice bridge at Davenport was still solid
enough for teams. We got into ST.
Louis on the 9th day of May. seven
months after leaving Davenport.
There we bad more bad luck. We ran
afoul of n wood fiat and sunk it. The
man sued us for damages; we beat
him in court, but we had our lawyers
| fees to pay. We sold fiat boat and
onions at auction. The onoins were
| spoiled because of a leak that had
sprung in the hull when we lay at
Otter island. The net proceeds after
paying the lawyer and the auction
1 eer. were 9o4. mat sum we ulN1ueu
among the crew, and we separated
/ went to Cincinnati. Mr.. Fulton
came down to ST. Louis to meet us,
laughed at our story. and said we
had done as well as we could, but he
never went near the boat or its cargo.
Only three of the crew stayed with it
all winter-Charles Anderson, Nc
| Closkey and myself"
Learning that our citizen, a. c..
Fulton, had furnished to the Pioneer
Lawmakers a sketch of early days,
the Republican requested copy,
| which follows: