Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 24.djvu/53

 "Presley Welch was captain of one of the trains, Joel Palmer and Samuel K. Barlow being his lieutenants. Samuel Hancock was captain of another train. Both of these trains left from Independence, Mo. Another company with over 50 wagons left from St. Joe. The captain of this wagon train being A. Hackelman. Still another wagon train left St. Joe, Mo., under command of W. G. T'Vault, John Waymire being his assistant. Sol Tetherow was in command of still another wagon train.

"I was seven years old when we started for Oregon. I can well remember what a hullabaloo the neighbors set up when father said we were going to Oregon. They told him his family would all be killed by the Indians, or if we escaped the Indians we would either starve to death or drown or be lost in the desert, but father was not much of a hand to draw back after he had put his hand to the plow, so he went ahead and made ready for the trip. He built a large box in the home-made wagon and put in a lot of dried buffalo meat and pickled pork. He had made over a hundred pounds of maple sugar the preceding fall which we took along instead of loaf sugar. He also took along plenty of corn meal. At Independence, Mo., he laid in a big supply of buffalo meat and bought more coffee. He also laid in a plentiful supply of home twist tobacco. Father chewed it and mother smoked it. To this day I enjoy seeing some white-haired old lady smoking her Missouri meerschaum, as we used to call the old corn cob pipes in those days. It reminds me of my mother.

"When we passed through Independence it was merely a trading post. The Indians were camped all around and were anxious to trade buffalo robes for shirts, powder, lead and fire water, preferably the latter. Father bought four finely tanned buffalo robes of the Indians.

"There were several stores in Independence, a number of blacksmith shops and wagon shops as well as livery stables and hotels.