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They raised a
large family. Dan T. Throe, their first child was born 18 Jan
1873 at Hauntown, IA. Then they moved to Maquoketa, Jackson,
IA where my father was a Remington Sewing Machine Agent for
some time, then gunsmith and was in the Brass Band. As my
grandfather was a musician, all of his boys were good in
music. There, I was born 16 Sep 1874, Ruth Sophia Throe.
My father left for the blackhills, with some other men
in the spring of 1877. My mother with her 3 children followed
late in the fall with an Uncle of hers, Gideon M. Johnson. By
railroad, we got off at Wamego, Potowatomie, KS. My father
failing to meet us. Mother hired a man with a hack to take us
12 miles over the prairie to where my father was and it rained
all the way. How glad I was to see my father again. I remember
living there in a dugout and playing over that top. Living
there over a year, then we emmigrated to Randolph, Dickeson,
KS. My father built a house, mother called it a Jennie-Lind,
being built boards stood straight up and down, battered. Our
mother was a rich mans only child, knew no hardships
before-never touched a baby until her first born.
There, 22 Aug 1879, another boy, George F. was born. We
called him Fred. Then the next spring, 10 May 1880, we joined
the "Washington Colony" and started across the
plains. Father
was the only blacksmith on the train of 48 covered wagons.
They begged him to go so we came with only $8 in father's
pocket, he took his family of his wife and 4 children. This
baby was my care, with the other little girl. I looked after
them all the way. I only being between six and seven years
myself. The trip was hard and tedious and for many, many miles
no habitation was seen, just the barren country, plaines,
desert, no water for the horses as well as people. Almost
went mad when water was found. They beat the horses back with
clubs to keep them from foundering themselves. Some of the
people were fought as well. Other places it was alkali, so
bitter you couldn't drink it. Baby Fred would reach toward
the stream and cry, he wanted water. I'd give him some, he
would push it away - kept reaching towards the creek. It was
the same as I got him. So bitter, couldn't kill it in the
strongest coffee. When we came to good water, it took 2 and
3 men to unhitch the teams, crazy for water.
One night when we reached the mountains, the first
night, grass was fine, knee high some places. The general
Manager rode around horseback, made all the children go into
the wagons, a panther was crying on the mountain - like a
woman in distress. He had a time keeping the young men from
climbing up to find the panther. That was the other side of
Cheyenne, Wyoming. Seems I can hear it yet, after several days
in the mountains, my father was above us on the mountain side,
called down to us. He was eating wild strawberries with one
hand and snow bulbs in the other.
One day when we were camped eating our supper, blanket
spread on the ground close to the fire, the manager came and
pointed to a trail - said to father that trail leads back to
our last nights camp, three miles away- we had traveled 20
miles that day. Horses were all gave out. That's roads in
those mountains. In memory I see it yet, my father would
shoulder his gun and walk all day, and sundown we would go
into camp. Father would work until 11 p.m. and many nights
until 1 a.m. Could hear the anvil ring. Our mother would
unhitch the team, put them out to feed, sometimes there was
nothing for them close by. Some men herded them. At night,
mother would rustle wood, sage brush, or buffalo chips. My
brother, Dan, helped her while I took care of the other two
children.
Mother baked in a dutch oven, pies at times and cakes,
as well as light bread. How good everything tasted. At other
times we had short rations as the commecery wagon was low on
foodstuff. Once a family on the "Clifton side" of the correll
stole all the flour and bacon that was left in the wagon, two
sacks of flour and two big sides of bacon. Not much, but it
would keep everyone from starving until we could get more
provisions. They searched every wagon. These folks refused to
have their's searched, as when they over-powered them. Found
the flour and bacon hidden in the very bottom of the wagon
box. They were taken on to the next place where a store had
supplies, given some groceries and turned out of the colony.
Their family consisted of he and wife, two grown sons and a
daughter in her teens. Have forgotten their names.
When we were in the
mountains some days, our team gave out, we were left behind to
rest the horses, then followed up, but never caught up until
the next morning and as we crossed a little mountain stream,
my father walked on ahead, or to see the light of campfires,
but none were visable, so he returned saying we will have to
stop here for the night as it's an aweful steep road ahead and
hard to go down, can't be done tonight, so we camped. He tore
up the pole stuck it not far from the campfire, as it began it
get began to get aweful dark my mother had the three children
go to the stream to wash. The camp was five miles ahead in
this canyon back in a cove.
My sister, Mary Naoma
was 2 years younger than me - when I was nearly 3 years old I
do remember a cyclone. I said come see the tree, it laid
down. Then the folks took us 3 kiddies back to Clinton,
IA. Mother said it was on a visit, all summer while our
father went to the blackhills in South Dakota sending for us
to come to him at Wamego, Kansas.
We camped by a creek
- it was raining hard. Everything was wet the next morning.
Had breakfast by campfire. A girl named Louise Miller brought
a big basket full of fresh baked bread. My mother did not
get baked the evening before so they baked it, brought it hot
to us.
It was a long and a
hard trip, many hardships. Father said we'd go back in 3 years
to mother's old home in Iowa as we were going back that fall
if the colony had not come along. Sun shown hot or else the
wind blew hard. Sand and dirt in our eyes, that is the way
it was for miles and miles - day after day. Mother drove and
father walked away from the train but kept close enough to
help when needed.
We had 2 doctors, old
Dr. Brown and Dr. Graham. We made 20 miles a day, but as the
days dragged along, food got scarcer, we got down to 12 to 15
miles a day - then 10 miles. We stopped one day a week to lay
over to rest the horses and ourselves and the women washed.
Water was scarce at times. Had 20 gallon barrels fastened
on outside of each wagon for drinking water.
It sure was a grand
sight to travel in the mountains and timber, cooler too. Still
I seem to hear the wagon wheels bumping over the rocks and the
echo in the canyons and see my father rough-lock the wheels
with big log chains, going down the aweful mountain roads, so
steep and far down, it was scary. The water barrels fastened
to wagons would come loose once in awhile, and far down in the
canyon it would roll, broken in a thousand pieces. I
remember when we ferried across the Green River, we were
nearly all day. We camped close by the night before. The
ferry was small. We only went 2 or 3 miles after we crossed
and camped for the night.
When we came through
Utah, I see the houses with flowers growing all around them. I
cried to stay there, said "why can't we have one of them
little houses, I'm tired, let's stay," mother said no it
wasn't flowers I saw but gardens, something to eat, and it was
the Mormon settlement. We couldn't stay there, but I kept
watching through the round hole in the wagon cover at the back
of the wagon until it faded from sight. Then I threw myself
down and cried so hard because I wanted to stay. That was
Salt Lake City.
Never will I forget
the scene there when we came through Idaho. I seem to see a
lake, we camped there, stretched our tents, plenty of grass.
Father picked out a tent as it was growing dark and took us
one by one wrapped in a blanket and struck us in the tent.
Somewhere near Cheyenne, Wyoming we stopped one night. Boys
were going back to town. Manager said "no boys, you'll get in
trouble," but they insisted. Manager made everyone hitch up
and go 10 miles farther on - it was way in the night when we
camped - laid over the next day.
One night as we had
just gone into camp, a cloud of dust ahead of us, came riders
with prisoners, it was a vigilantes committee. Two men who
had come out from the east somewhere sometime after the days
of '49, had no luck in California. Lost all they had - and
had worked for others. Could not get enough ahead to get a
team and grub to return home so they started on foot with pack
on their back. When the load got too heavy, they'd ditch a
blanket, then some cooking utensil, then shoes wore off their
feet - went barefoot. Finally they had ditched everything,
even their coats, got foot sore, so they watched the cowboys
horses when they hobbled them for the night. They came
along, took one apiece - rode it not fast, but steady 'til
somewhere in the mountains a bunch of cattlemen came and asked
to have a tent for their prisoners. They told of their
stealing their tired saddle horses and would hang them in the
morning.
Our men begged for
these two young men after they got their story as they tried
them without a court or a jury. They said they had come west
to find riches in the gold fields of California. Had spent
their all, and were broke and homesick. Were on their way
back home and footsore and couldn't hardly walk, so when they
came to saddle horses, they put a rope hackamore stile and
rode them bareback until they came to some more horses.
There, they would change, turn the others back the way they
come and go on. I don't think they changed very many times
until they were caught. The prisoners slept in our tent.
We took the wagon and my father stood guard with others that
night as it was his turn. We fed them the next morning and
they turned and went our way west and as we came along, away
up on the mountainside, two trees stood out. There hung these
young men. They rode away and left them for the birds to eat.
It seemed too far up
for us to go and we only had grub to carry us to the next
station. No one knew what the pioneers went through those
days. Our team gave out one afternoon and my father drove on
one side - said go on boys, I'll follow when the horses rest,
I'll be all right. I seem to see with heart-aching their
passing by, getting farther and farther ahead. I asked papa
- that is what we called him - to go on what will we do now,
no one with us? Father, mother and 4 kiddies in the wild
mountains. I was afraid.
We drove across a
mountain stream at sundown. The others had thrown poles in
as a bridge. Father pulled them out - then got busy, carried
in such a neat pile, more just before it got so dark. Mother
called us children to her and said go wash your hands and
faces, then she'd give us something to eat. We washed in
that cold mountain stream, got a drink, too. Dan, my oldest brother laid down. I said "dog, I can't
drink that way." Then our mother called. Broke two rolls
into - gave each 1\2 of one, mother and father took none - it
was all we had. Father kept a big bonfire all night.
At times I would
crawl in the back end of the wagon as they never stretched out
the tent that night. I called "papa, come to bed, you can
have my place." He said "Lula, go back to sleep." I'd be
quiet for a little while, then I would go back and call again
or ask why he had that red handky-like flag for. "So as they
will know it's us," he said but really it was for wild animals
but I never knew that.
When the darkness
began to break, wild birds began to twitter, just as the sun
peeked over the the top of the mountains, father said "Clara,
guess we'd better get moving if we ever catch up, don't you
think?" "Yes Hans, I do," so they hitched up the team. It was
never unharnessed that night so he went to the point where the
road started down - so very steep - came back and said "no one
in sight, guess we will have to try it alone. It's
dangerous, too. You'll have to drive, I'll keep on the upper
side of the wagon. The children must keep on the upper side of
the wagon. I said "papa, why can't I walk?" "No, your too
small. You could now keep up. Get lost."
So mother took the
lines after father put dead-locks on both hind wheels with
log-chains. Then he said "wait Clara, I'll look again" went to
point, said "yes Clara, here they come." One man came in
sight, then more and more, about 20 men waved to stay put till
they got there. Oh, what a wild rid down that mountainside we
had - we kiddies rolled around like kindling wood, could not
stay any place. They when we reached the bottom - five miles
down - women came, one with a frying pan with bacon, another
with camp bread, hot, and another with a pot full of coffee.
They said go on, take your old place - we were half way in the
line.
Mosquitos were
thicker than flies. We broke camp early the next morning.
Horses would rare up like they had never been broke. One
would hold them by the head while one would hook up the
tugs. When we went over a railroad track looking ahead where
the wagon ahead had gone through, it left a path in the
mosquitos. I called it a tunnel without a cover over it.
We had been told about it before we got there.
Then, somewhere in
Idaho, as we laid over to wash and rest as we did every week,
one day mother went to the tall sage brush, picked leaves and
put some in bottles to send back to relatives in the east.
Where we should get settled, somewhere in the state of
Washington, how she cried as she picked those leaves, so
homesick to return to her rich father, and other rich
relatives. But she soon took heart and kept steadly on. We
came through Boise City, but nothing to man us there. When
we got to Eagle Rock, one of our horses got poisoned on some
weed. When you patted him on the side, sounded like a tin
pan. My father got some horse from one in the crowd, tied
our horse behind the wagon, he wouldn't lead, broke the rope
so they tied him with a log chain. He would lay down and be
dragged, so then they left him at or near Eagle Rock, also our
heavy wagon.
One evening we were
getting supper. Sometimes we had wood, sometimes it was
buffalo chips. This evening, a woman came to our campfire
crying, "Oh, Mrs. Throe, we all are going to be murdered
tonight. Indian on warpath, aren't you afraid?" I gazed at
her, then mother. She said "no time to cry now, we are
here. The only thing I'll pray for is if they do come, I
pray they kill us all - leave no cripples to die alone without
water in this hot sun, take no prisoners." "Oh, how mean you
are, Mrs. Throe." I'll never forget that, but no Indians
came, they killed ahead of us - also behind - never bothered
our colony.
Whenever my parents
were lonely and sad, father would climb up on the wagon and
start a song, mother would join in - sometimes it would echo
back across the canyon. All would join along the crowd. They
had music camplight and dancing, church too, every night the
first 2 weeks, but after that all violins were put away - so
was the Bible as no church work. All too tired - glad to
laydown - those that were not there at night to stand guard
had several men taking 2 hour stands, some out among the
horses feeding, bring them in the corral. At midnight, my
father took out his anvil as we stopped
about sundown.
Our worst enemy were
horse thieves. They'd come ride down on one side of our train,
then back up the other sizing up our teams. Some were worth
$500 a span, others not so much. We had all horses and mules,
no oxen. When we came through Baker City, Oregon they sold
our last horse for $15. How we kiddies cried for Nelly, that
was her name. As we came over the hills to Union, Oregon,
seems to me the town was built on top of a rolling hill. Then
down on through the Grand Ronde Valley, how pretty it was, so
many lakes and so green. The sand ridge wasn't settled up
then.
We got to Summerville, Oregon 18 Aug 1880. How funny
everything looked to me. Put our things in one of the colony
wagons with the horse we had left - and left our wagon on the
roadside with a little child's chair. Someone had given it to
me to take care of the baby with. I cried for it, but it did
no good, we had to leave it. When we got to Summerville, my
father said "this is our paradise, we
won't go any farther." He walked up the street barefooted,
shoes wore off his feet. The general manager begged him to go
on, said we will stop in Walla Walla, Washington for the
winter, but father said no further for us.
The colony went on,
stopped where they said they would. General Manager, with his
bride of a few weeks when he left the East, died that winter
and Dr. Brown also died. Their widows went East the next year.
Back to relatives that were well off to live. The other Dr.
stayed in Walla Walla. The colony broke
up there. [End of Journal]
The Throe family
settled in the paradise of Summerville until 1888, when they
took their belongings in a wagon and herded their livestock to
Joseph. There they filed on land that was originally a tree
farm. Clara and Hans lived the remainder of their lives on
their claim in Wallowa County. Hans' mother, Sophia Throe,
came to Summerville after her husband, Peter, died in a
diphtheria epidemic back East. She died on May 20, 1890 and
was buried in the Summerville cemetery.
Union County |
