Excerpts from a book on "Jere" Kingsbury by Warren Taylor Kingsbury of Scottsdale, AZ Provided by Clea Mefford of Meridian, ID:

The Promised Land and Its Lure

What was the "Promise" of the Country which led Jeremiah Kingsbury and his family in the spring of 1817 to make the arduous trek from Randolph County, North Carolina, through the Cumberland Gap into , then over the Wilderness Trail to St. Louis and from there, northward up the Boonslick Trail, which paralleled the winding River to their destination of Fort Hempstead in Howard County.

Jeremiah, or Jere Kingsbury as he came to be called, had been born in Boonnville, New York December 5th, 1784. He was of the sixth generation of the Joseph Kingsbury who came to Massachusetts, from England in 1630. Jere made his way to Randolph County, North Carolina, where he spent a number of years, selling dry goods and other merchantable articles. In December 1811 he married Elizabeth Scotten. A son, Horace, was born April 7,1813; a second son, Noah, on August 4,1815. Jere, his wife and the two small children moved to Howard County, Missouri in 1817. Upon their arrival, they spent their first winter in Fort Hempstead.

From what little we know of Jere's years in North Carolina, he had established himself as a successful merchant. Why then did he pull up stakes and venture forth into an area where most settlers were still living in the stockade forts erected to protect themselves from assaults of the Indian tribes allied with the British in the ?

A Conjecture

We can only conjecture. The basis for mine is an untitled unpublished manuscript of my Uncle Lilburn Adkin Kingsbury (1884 to 1983), a Great-grandson of Jere. It is a carefully annotated story of the early days of the Boonslick Country and some of its pioneer people. It was written in 1942 when my hobbyhorse riding uncle mounted his "History Hobbyhorse" and rode off, searching out the history of the area and its people - especially his relatives and their southern-shaped way of life. (For reference purposes I have labeled it "Boonslick Country.") In this manuscript, Lilburn pictures the Boonslick Country and its pioneers through the eyes of some of its early visitors. I share these impressions with you.

John Bradbury's Visit

It was November 1811. The eminent English naturalist, John Bradbury, who had gone up the to study the plant life of the region, was on his return trip. Coming down the river, he and other members of his expedition were eager for the sight of other white men who might have news of the outside world. "About noon," he recorded in his diary, "We came in sight of a white man's house at Boon's Lick, and our boatmen immediately set up a shout. Soon after, some men appeared at the edge of a field of Indian corn close to the river; they invited us ashore and we willingly complied. In passing through the corn, I was much struck with its luxuriousness; I judged it to be not less than fourteen feet high and the ears were far above my head. "It was Sunday and when we arrived at the home, we found three women there all dressed in clean, white gowns, and being in other respects very neat; they formed a pleasing contrast to the squaws whom we had of late been in the habit of seeing. They soon spread the table for us and produced bread, milk and preserved fruits, which I thought the most delicious I had ever tasted."

Their Boonslick hosts regaled them not only with food, but imparted momentous news. The issues between the United States and Britain were strained and promised to lead to war. British agents in the Indian Territory were reported to be inciting the Indians to hostilities against the white people. And the faces of these settlers became serious with apprehension as they told Bradbury of the Indian peril at their own door. When they had come to this country they had found Indians. They had treated them with kindness, had even fed them hospitably, in a sincere effort to keep them friendly. But in spite of their solicitous overtures, the attitude of the natives had grown more hostile until now trouble was imminent. The Boonslick frontiersmen were laying aside all individual plans for the immediate future and were pooling their resources in an effort to build common shelters for the protection of themselves and their property.

Boonslick Forts

At three strategic points on the north side of the Missouri River, they built Forts Cooper, Kincaid and Hempstead, each a group of log cabins placed closely together and enclosed by a log stockade. The site of Fort Cooper was about two miles south of Boonslick, where the Boone brothers had made salt and from which this section of the country got its name, and (on the north side of the river) a like distance east of present day Arrow Rock. The other two forts were twelve miles down the river and within a mile and a half of each other.

These forts were modeled after those the settlers had known in Kentucky: They were shaped as parallelograms enclosing about an acre of land. A trench was then dug, four or five feet deep, and contiguous pickets planted in it, so as to form a compact wall ten or twelve feet above the ground. The pickets were of hard and durable timber, nearly a foot in diameter, and formed a rampart beyond the power of man either to leap or overthrow by the exercise of individual and unaided physical power. At the angles were small projecting squares of still stronger material and planking, technically called flankers with oblique port holes, so that the sentinel within could rake the external front of the station without being exposed to a shot. Two folding gates, in the front and rear, swinging on prodigious wooden hinges, gave ingress and egress to the men and teams in time of security. At other times, a trusty sentinel on the roof of an interior building, was stationed so as to be able to see at a distance every suspicious object

Each settler corralled his live stock in the fort nearest his land claim and took residence there. The threat the Indians posed brought about a common effort. Fields surrounding the forts were cultivated. with some settlers standing guard, others working the soil with a crude mattock hitched to a horse, and then harrowing it with brush drags. Trace chains of cow hide and plow lines of hemp were common. Sacking pins, sacking needles, and pitch forks were of wood. Harness hades were often made from the crook of an elm tree, and wagon wheels were fashioned by sawing off sections of a log from four to six inches wide. To add to settlers security in the forts, a company was organized in each and the three companies formed a battalion. Thus when war was declared in 1812, an act which definitely increased their peril, they were not without substantial, organized protection.

They Stood Their Ground

To further insure their safety, they pleaded with the Governor of the Territory, to send troops to the Boonslick frontier, but it was outside the acknowledged jurisdiction of the United States, He replied, "If you want protection, you must move to the strong settlements, haven't men to spare." Col. Benjamin Cooper, the battalion leader, had no thought of abandoning the improvements they had already made on the frontier. He declared indignantly that "that was no way to settle a country, it was not the way the colonies were settled, nor the way he and others had settled Kentucky." His comrades agreed with him. They resolved to stand their ground and save their settlements. In advising Governor Benjamin Howard of their decisions, Cooper wrote:

We have maid our homes here & all we have is here & it would ruin us to Leave now. We be good Americans, not a Tory or one of his Pups among us & we have 2 hundred men and boys that will fight to the last and we have 2 hundred Wimen & Girls that will take there places which made a good force. So we can Defend this Settlement. with Gods Help we will do So if we had a flew burls powder & 2 hundred lead is all we ask.

During the War, there were many Indian depredations and the people in the forts were put on their mettle. A description of conditions under which they lived, was embodied in resolutions drawn up by Col. Cooper in 1817 and sent to the government in the matter of securing settler's right of preemption of New Madrid claims as follows:

"In 1805, the United States government established a Board of Commissioners in Missouri to pass on the Spanish land titles which involved about 1,721,485 arpents (.85 of an acre of land) Although the majority of the titles were clear, many had been incompletely made or were fraudulent. Successive Congressional Acts eventually recognized most of the claims. . . A series of earthquakes beginning in 1811 rendered untillable much of the land in the New Madrid area. In 1815, Congress issued those certificates to the settlers in this region permitting them to take an equal amount of land anywhere in the Boon's Lick Country. The result was pandemonium. Speculators bought up many of the certificates; swindlers laid false claims. Later it was asserted that there were five times as many New Madrid claims as there had been heads of families in the earthquake area. ... [According to Dad, a number of title searches of land once owned by Jere, showed original owners as having exercised New Madrid Certificates of Right of Preemption.]

"...we vested the greater part of our property in stocks of cattle, horses and hogs which fell a prey to our enemies. At the commencement of the late war, the Indians who had received the kindest treatment from us, came upon us with their warwhoop and scalping knives. We felt as became Americans, we did not fly. We garrisoned our forts with our wives and children and while they kept the sentinel watch, we made bread under the protection of their rifles." The military companies were effective; they kept in communication with one another, watched the slinking Indians with so much vigilance, and encountered them with such boldness and courage as to keep them always in awe of the white men.

Fort Kincaid, located on the bottom prairie about one mile from the river, and a half mile south of Sulphur Creek was on the preempted claim of David Kincaid. At this particular fort, little actual trouble with the Indians was encountered. However, its inmates, like those of other forts lived in a state of aggravation. Full enjoyment of the resources of the country, was like the fox's grapes, always out of reach.

While peace was declared in 1815, most of the settlers did not leave the forts to reestablish their homes until the following year, As they moved out of Fort Kincaid, other families moved in and it continued to be a crowded settlement.

Howard County has been called "The Mother of Counties' " When the Missouri Territory was created from the Purchase in 1812 Benjamin Howard was Territorial Governor and the county was named for him. It then included about one third of the state's area. Many of the state's counties were created from it as growing population spurred establishing additional towns. Boonville, south of the river was the original county seat of Howard County. In 1816 the area south of the river became Cooper County with Boonville as the county seat. The newly appointed Commissioners of Howard, the area north of the river, decided the new county seat should be named for Benjamin Franklin. It was laid out on the north side of the River, along the water front within two miles of Fort Kincaid. Lots were sold, the land was cleared of its giant trees, and dwellings appeared as if by magic. Stores and shops sprung up around a two-acre "square" upon which were built a $365.00 court house and an imposing two-story jail which cost almost four times that sum, a large one, as if the fathers of this county commonwealth anticipated the advent of many other than peaceful, law-abiding citizens. Here was established the first post office, "Howard Court House."

Independence Day 1817

The county seat, however, was not without a rival. Two miles to the north, "on the waters of the Bonne Femme and Cottonwood [creeks] near Fort Hemstead, was a flourishing, small village, Warrington. Here in 1817, was held the Independence Day celebration for the Boonslick country. The national flag was displayed. "A large number of the most respectable citizens of the community" assembled to hear John W. Souder, Esq., read the Declaration of Independence, and Augustus Storrs, A.B., pronounce an oration. A "superb and splendid dinner" was provided by Messres. Hickman and Estill, the latter of whom was at that time, the licensed tavern keeper at his place of residence in Fort Hempstead. After the dinner cloth was removed, George Tompkins, a legal light who had hung out his shingle at Burckhartt's Salt Works, where he resided in 1815, was chosen "President of the Day." With him in the chair, nineteen toasts were proposed and drunk, with universal applause. It is possible that the Jere Kingsbury family had arrived that spring and were present for the celebration.

The Prospectors Came Prospectors poured into Franklin. Most of them were former landowners principally from , North Carolina, Kentucky and who had left worn-out farms or congested districts, to search for rich soil, and enough of it on which to establish homes for both themselves and their children. Lawyers, merchants, doctors, money changers dressmakers, gamblers and adventurers also came on the tide, eager to become a part of the town that had sprung up like a Jack-in-the-box, or of the wonderful Boonslick country. All of them anticipated rich harvests in their respective fields Many of the new arrivals first found lodging in the cabin homes of Forts Kincaid and Hempstead.

This influx of people was stimulated by word received back home from those who had made the move West and settled in Boonslick Country. Typical of such was John Welch, who wrote his brother, William: ... there is other country besides North Carolina just as healthy a gradual richer country with many advantages for all classes of man in every branch and business of life and that with an Equality not known in any other country.

And from another man to his nephew

... Crops look very promising and I do say I never saw such corn in my life, the stalks are so large that when we come to gathering it, we will have to take ladders to climb up to the ears. I have got 23 acres in corn which looks very promising.

Henry, I must tell you the truth about this country - I am just where I always craved to be. We can work all summer and in the fall shoot all kinds of game, squirrels, coons, opossums, groundhogs, turkey and deer, wild geese and ducks ... the corn is ripening now and the squirrels will pour in by the thousands...

I would like to see you in this promised land where you have no need to work for the land is so rich you may plant crowbars at night and it will sprout ten penny nails by morning. P.G.Smith.

The communications that triggered Jere Kingsbury's interest in the highly touted Boonslick Country are veiled in the mists of the past, but something certainly aroused his curiosity about this so-called "Promised Land." One important factor must have been the end of the War, and a lessening fear of Indian attacks on the settlements, Another, the news that the town of Franklin was being laid out in 1816 for a county seat of government. This with stories of fabulously productive farm land doubtless impressed him. Although he was getting along in Randolph County, he was not very optimistic about the area offering much future for his children. Somehow he heard of the promising future beckoning from Missouri and decided to go see for himself. Knowing his wife Elizabeth, could call on her parents for help needed in caring for their two small children, Jere determined to make his way to see if Boonlick Country was indeed the "Promised Land."

What manner of man was Jeremiah, progenitor of the Boonslick Country Kingsburys and their descendants, who made the trek out to Howard County in the fall of 1816 and spent the winter in Benjamin Estill's Tavern in Fort Hempstead?

His picture (obviously dressed in his Sunday best) shows him as a man with head held high and a determined look. We are told his eyes were a bright blue and that he was about five feet seven inches in height. He was stockily built, but never put on much weight.

My father William Wallace (Billie) Kingsbury was a banker lawyer in Boonville. Over the years, he had occasion to review hundreds of abstracts of property in the Boonslick Country. Many of these showed Jere Kingsbury had once been the owner. According to Dad, at one time Jere could hike the six miles from his home place to Fayette without setting foot on property he did not own. Dad was so impressed by the astuteness of his Great-grandfather's trading ability, financial acumen and straightforward character as portrayed in stories filtered down to him through his parents that he named my younger brother Jere. According to Dad, Jere had an uncanny ability to evaluate the potential future of property. After returning to North Carolina and bringing his family to Howard County in 1817, this ability and much hard work enabled him to provide amply for his growing family and to amass what by the time of his death in 1863, was a considerable estate. The stories as told to me by Dad were that as a boy Jere did not shirk work. He left home when he was 14, worked at night for his room and board and went to school until he found work carrying mail. Saving his money, his entrepreneurial nature manifested itself when he had accumulated forty dollars. This money he invested in pots, pans and other household commodities, profitably peddling them in nearby New York villages. A few years of this and Jere made his way to Randolph County, North Carolina. He established himself as a merchant. On November 21, 22 /23 1811, he married Elizabeth Scotten, daughter of John and Ann Scotten, "a lady of Dutch extraction." The Scottens were established slave-owning farmers near Liberty in Randolph County. According to Dad, Jere was a devoted family man, a God-fearing Christian, whose word was as good as his bond. He believed God would reward hard work and good deeds and see him safely out to the "Promised Land." Something of a feeling that "wherever I go, Jesus is with me and I need not fear."

On to Fort Hempstead

Many others also were attracted by reports of growing opportunities in the Boonslick country now that the Indians were being driven out and were no longer a serious threat. Probably Jere attached himself to a group of like-minded people heading West. He must have traveled horseback leading a loaded pack-horse. I'm sure he carried his prized Kentucky rifle and had a powder horn and bullet pouch on his belt. "Kentucky rifles had a barrel forty-two inches in length or longer usually octagonal with a stock of curly maple, cherry, apple, or walnut, extending to the muzzle, a patch box, trigger guard, side plate, red pipes, front sight, and brass butt plate. The ball approximately 3/100 of an inch smaller in diameter than the barrel was inserted in the muzzle wrapped in a greased patch of buckskin and then rammed home with a hickory ramrod. From one pound of lead forty- eight bullets were normally molded for the .45 caliber Kentucky flintlock."

"Jere's powder horn must have been the one my grandfather showed me when I was a young boy saying it had been his Grandfather's."

Travelers at that time were still depending upon their rifles to provide meat for meals. It must have taken Jere a month or longer to make the trip to Fort Hempstead. There, he put up at the Estill Tavern in Fort Hempstead. The fort was about a mile from the budding town of Franklin and its residents were optimistically excited by the activity under way. The newly designated County Commissioners of Howard County had obtained for the new County Seat a 55 acre tract of land in what was known as "Cooper's Bottom." It was in the area where later the now-abandoned Missouri, Kansas & Texas railroad tracks crossed Highway 67 and went on over the bridge to Boonville. Two acres of this were set aside for county buildings. The remainder was laid out with streets separating half acre lots. By the time Jere arrived in late fall, a court house and jail had been completed and men were busily engaged in erecting shops and log cabins on streets that had been staked out.

There are a few dates which contradict other dates in the book and the records I have confirm those other dates. Also it states that Elizabeth's mom is Ann Scotten. But the other records which we have place her as Elizabeth so maybe her name was Ann Elizabeth or Elizabeth Ann. Since there is a Ann Margaret. But you will notice they have the other things that we do to confirm her father as John Scotten. I don't know where the Ann came from.

The Historic Boonslick Country

Much before the War of 1812, the area had become known as the Boonslick Country. This was because had left "over-crowded Kentucky" and settled on a farm near St. Charles on the Missouri River. In 1807 Boone and his two sons Nathan and Daniel Morgan, were prospecting for suitable sites to settle along the north side of the Missouri River. They found a spring with a substantial flow of salt water near where Franklin was later laid out in 1816.

Salt was then a very precious commodity. It was much in demand by fur trappers for curing and preserving pelts for the market as well as the game they killed for food. In 1807 the Boones transported huge kettles to this spring. The salt was produced by pouring salt water or brine into the kettles and heating it over a stone furnace. As the brine boiled, the water evaporated, leaving a salt crystal residue. Approximately 300 gallons of water was required to produce 60 pounds of salt. Much of the salt was packed into hollowed out logs capped with mud and floated down the river to the St. Louis market. When the Boone Brothers became Majors in the Missouri Militia which undertook to protect the settlers from Indian raids during the War of 1812, they sold out to James and Jesse Morrison. The Boone's Lick Salt Works continued to be the primary source of salt for St. Louis and the Missouri River settlements until 1833.

Barroom Nights

During Jere Kingsbury's stay at Estill's Tavern in Fort Hempstead, the barroom, with dancing flames from the logs in the big fireplace helping light up and warm the room, must have been a busy place in the winter evenings. Men working 'till dark with the buildings, trappers going and coming from hunting grounds in the western wilderness, and people such as Jere there prospecting the enticing opportunities they heard were opening up, gathered in the barroom for companionship. They were eager for latest news brought by the arrivals from the East. They exchanged gossip and told tall tales of their adventures fighting Indians. trapping beaver, and overcoming hazardous travel conditions on trails and rivers. The fabulous marksmanship of famous frontier Indian-fighter, Daniel Boone was the subject of many of these. It was here Jere met the Boone and Morrison brothers. Many a glass was raised to those heading further West in search of furs, and to welcome trappers with their pelt packs on their way back to the markets in St. Louis.

We have no record of how long Jere stayed at Fort Hempstead but it must have been until early spring. He apparently decided against locating in Franklin and before returning to North Carolina arranged to buy a tract of land on which there was a horse mill. It was near the earlier settled town of Warrington, which was abandoned before the Civil War. The exact site of the village is not known. A horse mill required two horses to turn the stones which ground the corn. It promised a source of income from corn planting neighbors who would bring their ripened ears in sacks containing three or four bushels. Jere was impressed by the reports of the bountiful crops which settlers, who had broken ground and planted, had harvested. Corn was the most important crop. Sheltered by the towering stalks, pumpkin vines winding in and out of the rows produced prolifically. The pumpkins attained vast size, had delicious flavor, made wonderful pies and could be cut and dried for eating in the spring. Many of the settlers had developed planting grounds near their cabins where they grew turnips, potatoes, watermelons and muskmelons.

Boonslick Flora and Fauna

Jere asked many questions and was a careful observer. Most of what he heard and saw was to his liking. Certainly he was impressed with the "flora and fauna," Much of the land was still as Nature had developed it. In the bottom lands were towering sycamore and cottonwood trees intermingled with walnut, hickory and pecan. Cedar and oak were abundant on the slopes of the bluffs. There were persimmon, wild cherry, wild plum trees and wild grape vines clinging to the trees. Some had pearly-white berried mistletoe attached to branches, others had long strands of bittersweet with its reddish orange berries Paw-paw patches, blackberry and gooseberry bushes and strawberry plants promised tasty fruit.

Jere found the woods had lots of game. Deer, elk and wild turkeys were plentiful. Small game - squirrels, rabbits, possums and coons, abounded. Residents told him that in spring and fall, migrating flocks of geese, ducks and cranes filled the air, landing and feeding in the lagoons. Coveys of quail frequently whisked up from underfoot and winged off as one walked through the grass. Bear were occasionally sighted; buffalo herds still ranged the nearby prairies. From time to time at night the howl of wolves, and the womanlike cry of the panther could be heard. Myriad’s of birds nested in the trees.

Jere's Decision

In 1816 Boonslick Country was still largely a wilderness, but Jere was convinced it offered a promising future for those with courage, determination and the will to work hard. It is likely Jere managed to get someone going back East to carry a letter to Elizabeth telling of his decision to leave North Carolina and bring her and their two children to Howard County. This would enable her to start readying things so they could start as soon as possible after his return. He could tell her what household goods and tools were available in the shops that were being opened in Warrington and Franklin. If such a letter was sent back home, Jere probably told her the Fort Hempstead settlers had organized a Baptist Church, the first Church in the area. It was called Mount Pleasant. Elizabeth was a devout Christian and Jere thought knowing there was an active religious group they could associate and worship with would ease some of Elizabeth's anxiety at moving so far from her parents and friends.

Traveling the Wilderness Trail

We have no hard facts about the actual journey of the Jere Kingsbury family to the Boonslick Country. It seems likely it was in the spring of 1817. We are told they made their way through the Cumberland Gap and along the Wilderness Trail. We do not know when they left North Carolina, when they arrived in Howard County; how long the difficult trip took; where they may have crossed the Ohio River [though we believe it probably was Lexington) and from where they made their way through Indiana and Illinois to St. Louis and thence up the Boonslick Trail along the Missouri River to Howard County.

The Kingsburys must have had at least one covered wagon loaded with household goods such as bedding, clothing, a spinning wheel, cooking pots and pans, axes, hatchets, hammers, crowbars and other tools. The cover would provide shelter for Elizabeth and the children at night and in the inclement weather they surely experienced. We don't know if Jere was a slave owner before moving to Missouri. if so, one or two slaves may have trudged along behind the wagons leading heavily laden pack horses.

Probably the most important tool they carried was "The Axe." Axes used by the frontiersmen weighed from three to four pounds according to the strength of him who was to wield it. The handle was invariably made of shagbark hickory, of an ovate shape, about two feet four inches in length and always having scratched on it a one and two feet measure for the purpose of measuring off the "rail cuts" or the cabin logs. Grindstones were scarce but every house was provided with a whetstone, and when the instrument was newly sharpened, woe be to the boys or the women who might dull it against stone or turn its edge by cutting a gammon of bacon. The lower part of the handle was always made smaller than the upper, to give it a slight degree of elasticity which not only increased the power of the instruments but saved the hand from a jar in using it. Finally, it was a rule, never to be violated, to warm the blade or edge in winter before using it to chop hard wood, otherwise the blade might break. ... wonderful how many different things could be done with this instrument.(23)

Elizabeth may have had a brother named Peter Scotten accompany them. (Peter Scotten is a signator along with Jere and Elizabeth to a document giving Power of Attorney to Nicholas Amick to represent them in settling the estate of Elizabeth's parents. Probably it was this Peter Scotten who was the progenitor of the Scotten family in Howard County.

Like most families traveling west, the Kingsburys probably joined up for companionship and mutual assistance with others heading west. Helping hands were important when accidents or illness beset members of the group, and when camp was made at night to take turns keeping watch against intruders or wild animals, Elizabeth must have been busy from dawn into night-fall, seeing after the children, and cooking for and feeding them all. If they did travel in a party, probably communal cooking was done to share game killed by designated hunters.

By the time Jere Kingsbury & family traveled the Wilderness route, the Indians who in earlier years threatened pioneers' passage and had been responsible for many deaths tomahawked and scalped, had for the most part been driven from the country. However, the Wilderness Trail was still primitive and travel arduous when Jere and his family traveled it. Food was sometimes difficult to come by, and sometimes required going two days without a mouthful to eat. Feet blistered, legs and thighs were raw with the scratches of the thistles and briars in the midst of a world of cragged rocks and cliffs, under a broiling sun, exhausted by fatigue, hunger and despair.

In addition to living with the dangers of travel, the move meant giving up the familiar for the unknown, security for insecurity, comfort for discomfort. It frequently meant breaking family ties with parents, and siblings, and resigning oneself to never seeing close neighbors and old friends again. It meant abandoning daily routines, which although they may have seemed onerous and unrewarding were at least known. But for many the distant lands of the Boonslick Country indeed had the lure of the Promised Lands or the Pot of Gold at the end of the Rainbow. (24)

By 1817 the primitive road hewed through the rocks, trees and brush of the Cumberland Gap in 1775, by Daniel Boone and a party of thirty axemen and continued on into Kentucky to Lexington, had been made more traversable for wagons. At various points along the way crude taverns, had been established to accommodate travelers need for refreshment and supplies. Aside from providing shelter from the elements, these taverns offered little in the way of comfort. Many consisted of only a single common room, which served all purposes. The few beds available in even the better inns had cornshuck mattresses. It was customary for men, women and children to sleep rolled in their blankets on the floor of the public room which was heated only by the fireplace, At best the trip along the Wilderness Trail was arduous for families with small children requiring constant oversight. I'm sure their parents were frequently besieged with plaintive cries such as: "Mommy! Daddy! When are we going to get there? I'm tired. Why did we have to leave home?"

Travelers generally cooked over open fires when they stopped at night and again before they started out the next morning. Often they slept huddled together around a fire which had to be replenished during the night. In the daytime they tried to stop for rest at a spring or clear little stream marked on the rout map prepared and passed on by predecessors Here they would boil coffee to wash down the now cold food readied the night before or in the early morning. With all the energy required by their travel, one wonders how much appreciation they had of the often lushly beautiful country they were traversing. I expect at least as much or more than some of us feel as we speed along an interstate highway.

Be that as it may, Benjamin Estill's tavern at Fort Hempstead, must have been a welcome sight to the weary Kingsburys. They lodged at the tavern for a time while they readied the little cabin on the land Jere purchased on his previous trip to make sure his family had a home. I presume the cabin was similar to those constructed by early settlers at that time. If so, it would have been a thirty by twenty rectangular structure. The walls were made of notched round logs, built up from the ground, nine or ten feet high, with the top logs cut three or four feet longer than the others to form eaves. The roof, built of graduated length, was covered with clapboards cut four feet by six inches. Doors and windows were then chopped out. Windows were closed on the inside with heavy greased wrapping paper which let in some light. When glass became available and settlers could afford it, paper was replaced by glass. Clay was used to close up the chinks between the logs. Floors consisted of notched puncheons laid on sleepers. Ceilings were sometimes constructed of saplings extended from wall to wall and overlaid with boards. Hearths were stone. Cooking was done in the fireplace using long-handled skillets and kettles and pots suspended over the fire by a swinging crane. After some of the accommodations found on the journey, the cabin they moved into must have seemed luxurious.

We know in the early days of the Boonslick Country there was no established postal service connecting the settlers with relatives and friends in the eastern communities from which they had emigrated. Although Franklin was the first town in the area to have a post office "established in the Court House shortly after it was completed in 1816", mail delivery was erratic. Beginning in 1819, it was brought up the river from St. Louis by steamboat, Urgent letters regarding deaths, or other pressing family crises usually required pressing a family member, trusted friend or express rider into service to carry the letter and news to its intended recipient. Anyone who regularly traveled back and forth to the east once or twice a year served as a mail carrier and a news source both ways. People often delayed such travelers while hastily preparing messages for them to deliver, or sent letters by couriers to travelers already on their way. It took time and many letters were lost or went astray in being passed from person to person.

We complain about postal service today. How long do you suppose it would have taken Elizabeth Scotten Kingsbury's letter informing her parents she and the family had safely made their way through the Cumberland Gaps and along the Wilderness Trail through Kentucky and finally along the Boonslick Trail to Fort Hempstead in Howard County? We do not know if Elizabeth or Jere wrote such a letter, but as they both appeared to have been family oriented, they probably did.

Early Boonslickians

When Jere and Elizabeth Kingsbury became a part of the Boonslick community, what kind of people did they find?

Lilburn Kingsbury reports that when he asked his father about the morals of the early contemporaries of the Jere Kingsburys, Taylor Kingsbury expressed a belief that "the early settlers set quite high standards of behavior for themselves, and the man who committed acts offensive to his fellow-men was practically ostracized, even the saloon-keeper was set apart as someone who must be countenanced but certainly not approved. I asked him what of the grocery stores which kept liquor for sale, how their keepers were regarded as compared with saloon keepers and he said that the stores were a different sort of place. People would buy liquor to take home or drink, but they did not loiter and linger at the place, as they did in the saloon, and that the saloon was always the lounging place of a certain element which was considered very crummy. The habitual drunkard was looked upon with much lifting of the brows.

Most of the early settlers seeking to establish themselves in the "Promised Land" were hard-working men and women, determined by the sweat of their labor to improve their lives, and provide for the comfort and needs of their families. The fertile soil and plentiful wild game made that possible. Few restrictive laws had been established for their governance. If a man committed an offense by defrauding or swindling his neighbor, he was left to himself, no one giving him countenance or having any social intercourse with him, and he soon reformed or left the neighborhood. Men who indulged in liquor to its abuse were treated in the same way; by strict adherence to these practices, newly settled communities were soon rid of those that had no self respect. This resulted in a generally high type of manhood and moral honesty being present. Men's word was as good as a bond in those days, and really better, for we frequently have to sue on a bond and enforce its provisions by law. Confidence in each other was such they had no fear of a failure.

A majority of Boonslick community settlers came from Virginia, North Carolina, Kentucky and Tennessee. Their families had been landowners back where they came from. They wished to own and live on sizeable tracts of land, so they avoided the developing towns and took advantage of the opportunities available to acquire sizeable tracts of land. They brought with them many of the best traditions of the south: Belief in the almighty, gentility, courteous behavior, neighborliness, love of good food, and hospitality. As they prospered and built substantial plantation-like homes there was much inter-family visitation which often resulted in marriage between the children. Most such marriages were compatible, the new families often with the help of their parents, acquired sizeable farms of their own, prospered and raised large families. The Boonslick Country was literally a "" in the values, beliefs, attitudes and culture of its plantation-minded families.

Those "Little Dixie" families ate well. They had a liking for such things as country ham steaks and red ham gravy, ham baked in milk, barbecued ribs and back-bone, country sausage and head cheese; fried chicken and baked chicken, chicken pie and dumplings and chicken soup, eggs from the henhouse and bacon from the smokehouse; sauerkraut with squabs and turnips with spareribs, spring greens from the yard and roadside, and green beans with fat pork-bush beans as long as they last and then long pole beans until frost. Their tables groaned with dish on dish of berries -strawberries, blackberries, raspberries, floating in cream; with Jonathan, Grimes Golden, Winesap and Black Twig apples; apple pie, apple cobbler, apple strudel, baked apples, fried apples and apple cider; homegrown tomatoes and watermelons, an endless number of pickles, always including pickled peaches and "end of the garden"; vast varieties of jellies and preserves; persimmons whitened and sweetened by frost; popovers, wheatcakes and honey, piping hot biscuits and gravy; and an incredible variety of cakes and pies.

Jere and Elizabeth were not contented with their little cabin for long. Jere wanted a more spacious house for his family, especially as Elizabeth was pregnant. (The first daughter, Evalina, was born September 22, 1818.) In what was probably the first of many advantageous land deals, Jere sold his first farm for a tidy profit. He then bargained for 400 acres of rolling land a mile north of Burkhard'sSalt Lick about four miles east of Fort Hempstead, a claim located in Sec. 9, Township 49, range 16, of what is now known as Franklin Township. This claim became the center of his extensive land holdings. Here he built one of the first substantial brick houses in the area. Such a place was really needed as in the next twenty years there were eight additional births to the couple. All but two of the eleven children survived to adulthood.

We know of no surviving pictures of Jere Kingsbury's home which was destroyed by fire some time after his death.

One of the Kingsbury granddaughters, Mrs. Kate Kingsbury Cox, and her son, Edwin Cox, in 1933 described the home as being a one story brick house, covering most of the yard, [When so described in 1933, this was a large yard]. There were large old black locust trees outside the yard which looked as if they had weathered many storms. Those trees inside the yard were younger and more shapely. The old locusts were said to have been brought as seedlings when the family came to the area. Being planted farther from the house, it was thought they had not been hurt when the house burned, while the inside yard had to be replanted with trees after the fire. The remains of a kiln for firing bricks, together with the number of broken bricks, scattered over the farm, indicated it was a sizeable house.

Making Brick

The process by which the bricks were made was described by a great-grandson, Lilburn Kingsbury :

Clay was dug on the farm and placed in a clay mixer with water. The clay mixer was a large sycamore log hollowed out with a screw type dasher inside. The dasher was connected to a large pole turned by a horse walking in a circle. When the clay and water were mixed to the desired consistency, the mud mixture was run through a spout at the bottom of the mixer into wooden molds. Each mold held three bricks. When the molds were filled, a boy called the "off bearer" carried the green wet bricks to a smooth place on the ground where they were left to dry in the sun. If it rained on the bricks before they were burned, they were ruined and a new supply had to be made. The bricks were turned regularly until they were dried on all sides. When the drying had been completed, the bricks were stacked to form a kiln. Each kiln was covered with ruined brick and the whole plastered over with mud.

Wood was used for fuel to fire the bricks. Firing usually took from a week to ten days. The bricks for a specific project were all fired at the same time. The lime used for mortar in laying the bricks was home made and quarried from the lime stone bluffs. It was prepared in a special kiln.

I assume the brick making and construction of the house was done principally by slaves and that Elizabeth also had "house slaves" to assist her in caring for the growing family, the cooking and house work. Most of the family's clothes were made from cloth woven in the home which meant much carding and preparation of the wool for spinning and weaving.

A number of slaves were also needed as field hands for as the years passed and Jere prospered, more acreage was put into crops requiring intensive labor. Jere was a good judge of land. He chose farm land where the fertile rolling upland gave way to the limestone bluffs. Here the stone was easily quarried and converted into lime. He liked to buy adjoining acres, and a legend grew up - not entirely accurate - that he could walk six miles - all the way to the county seat [Fayette], and never set foot on land other than his own. He bought other land too, picking up bargains in the fertile Missouri River bottom above Franklin.

The Kingsbury house fronted on one of the early trails traveled by immigrants hoping to settle in the Boonslick country. Near the trail Jere kept a pen of fat hogs. He also operated a still on the farm. He found a ready market for pork and whisky, selling it and other commodities to travelers who needed supplies.

The Scotten Estate

Taking care of such business apparently kept Jere too occupied to go back to North Carolina at the time Elizabeth's father's estate was being settled in 1834. We do know, thanks to painstaking research by cousin Carl Stapleton in 1990 of court records in Randolph County, North Carolina, that Jere and Elizabeth and "we assumes brother" Peter Scotten commissioned Nicholas Amick to go back to North Carolina and act as their agent in settling the Scotten estate.

Hog Killing Days

With so many of their children married and occupied with agricultural enterprises, certain communal routines developed. One of these was "hog killing." Lilburn Kingsbury in his article in the Bulletin of the Missouri Historical Society, Vol. VIII, No. 4. July 1952, "Changing Times on a Boon's Lick Farm" pp. 380-81, vividly describes how this was done in Jere's time:

... Plans were made days ahead and care was used to choose a sign when the time was right." No housewife who fried meat wanted to see a big cake of sausage in the skillet shrink to a mere pat, or a slice of bacon melt away until little was left but the rind. Nothing was allowed to interfere on the day set aside for butchering. There were so many phases of it that everybody in the household had a part.

On the day before the killing, the hogs were penned up to fast overnight. A ditch was cut and a large vat, later to be filled with water, was set in place over it. Firewood was laid under the vat and a fire lit to bring the water to a boil. A work table was set up close to the vat, and a long heavy beam was trussed up horizontally from which to hang the butchered hogs.

When all hands were assembled and the water in the pot was boiling hot, a rifle shot in the head laid the first hog low. Haste was used to thrust a knife into its jugular vein. After it had bled sufficiently, the body was lifted into the scalding vat to loosen its hair. Soon it was drawn out on the table, steaming hot, and men with sharp knives worked feverishly to scrape off all dirt and hair. After this close shave, the clean white carcass was suspended from the hind legs from the beam, drawn, rinsed and left hanging there the rest of the day and night to "cool out." A lighted lantern, suspended from the beam, was left to police these prepared carcasses, warding off dogs and varmints.

The ensuing days were busy ones. The carcasses were cut up, the joints trimmed, the sausage meat made ready and ground. The fat was prepared and rendered over an outdoor fire. The women made link sausage. They fried down some or cold-packed it along with the tenderloin. They boiled the heads to make head-pudding and souse. They pickled the feet. Each year they reached a state of desperation which caused them to declare they hoped they would never see another piece of pork! Presents of backbone, ribs and sausage were sent to neighbors, some of whom would return the favor when they butchered. The men sugar-cured the hams, shoulders and bacons. The slaves greedily appropriated the small intestines or chitlins, which they fry and enjoy as the greatest delicacy in the world. Livers and ears given them were great boons. They were also thankful for the pigtails, knowing full well the sweetness of these tidbits. You who love a chicken neck will never settle for another, once you have tasted pigtail.

When the confusion of butchering was over, everybody, through necessity, entered a pork- eating marathon. It was necessary to exercise the strength of the combined appetites of the household to keep the pork from growing strong.

... there were sessions with boiled backbone , baked ribs, cold or fried hog-head pudding, sausage, tenderloin, vinegared souse and pigsfeet. If life on the farm had been mounted on ball bearings it couldn't have rolled smoother.

And There Were Apples

Another of Jere's agricultural enterprises was a large apple orchard. Not only did he supply his neighbors; he profitably shipped many bushels of apples and other produce down the river to St. Louis. He also made cider. A great grandson, Lilburn Kingsbury in his Boonville Daily News column, "Lilburn Says," March 1, 1982 writes of this:

Jere Kingsbury had planted an apple orchard and being a thrifty man, he did not plan for any apples to go to waste, so with a crude, homemade press he extracted the apple juice by crushing the apples with a wood mallet in a hollowed-out log. The resulting liquid became a marketable product, vinegar. An old account book recorded that he sold from one to ten gallons of vinegar per customer to all the families in the area at 25 cents per gallon. He was so very generous with his married children who lived nearby, he made them buy their vinegar too.

Jere Gives Eldest Son a Start

Despite the above implication of stinginess with his children, they were all cherished by Jere and Elizabeth. In 1832 when his son, Horace, married Eliza Ann, daughter of his neighbor, Judge Judson Brashear, who had come to Howard County from Kentucky, he gave the young couple a $45 horse, a $7 rifle gun, and 240 acres of virgin river-bottom timber land valued at $1500. His only proviso was that they should live on the land and cultivate it.

The bride and groom moved into a log cabin in a clearing so small that the sun pierced its leafy shade only about an hour or two at noon. Their equipment for housekeeping was meager, but they were proud of their feather bed and a set of silver spoons. As part of her dowry, Eliza Ann had a blind pony; Horace owned a heifer. Later his father gave them a man slave valued at $500 and by 1840 they had acquired six more slaves who served them until the Civil War.

Their wilderness river bottom land was thick with walnut, pecan, sycamore, and cottonwood trees, some of giant growth. A tangled underbrush of vines and berry brambles provided shelter for minks, weasels, groundhogs, skunks, opossums, squirrels and rabbits. There were birds of many species, and migrant prairie chicken, wild turkeys, ducks and geese in season. But the swampy land was infected with malaria-spreading mosquitoes, and the young people came to dread the months of July, August and September for the chills and fever they invariably brought.

As hard work and careful management paid off, Horace, emulating his father, bought several adjoining properties. In 1844 he bought Nicholas Amick's Federal Style brick house. This was the same Nicholas Amick to whom his father and mother, when her parents' estate was being settled in August 1834 gave their Power of Attorney and sent back to North Carolina to represent them. Amick and Kingsbury families remained close friends for many succeeding generations. The Horace Kingsburys moved into the Federal Style brickhouse and in 1854 added the extensive Greek Revival section. Cedar Grove, as the house was named, is one of the oldest homes in Howard County still serving as a residence. It is on Highway 2, three miles west of New Franklin in a shady, park-like yard with a drystone wall and marker in front. It stands on a gentle wooded slope facing a panoramic view across Missouri River bottom lands and bluffs on the opposite Cooper County side. Cedar Grove is listed on the National Register of Historic Homes and has been lovingly restored by its present owners, George and Elaine Derendinger.

Other Children Treated Generously

So far as we know, the other Kingsbury children were also generously treated by their fond parents. The second son, Noah, was given all the educational advantages that were provided in that early day. In state, town and school affairs his advice was eagerly sought. He married Nancy Hughes December 24,1835 and died May 24 1851. They had three children.

Jere's first daughter, Evalina, married a Stapleton and they had 10 children. In none of the material available to me, have I found what Jere gave her at the time of her marriage, but it would have been unlike him not to have treated her as equitably as he did the other children. The Stapletons lived much of their married life in Texas. Evalina died September 7, 1882.

The second daughter, Emily, born February 24, 1822, married Thomas Tindall, April 18,1859. They had seven children; two sons and five daughters. Emily died in 1877.

The third son, Lemuel Leonard, also benefited from a Jere farm gift. On January 16, 1849, he married Catherine Boggs. Leonard was a successful farmer and stockman, specializing in merino sheep. When Jere grew older, he turned the management of the home farm over to Leonard. It was considered one of the best improved farms in the county. According to a Leonard great-granddaughter, Martha Ferry, "A portion of our "lower farm" down the road just south of our house [on Highway #5 between New Franklin and Fayette] was part of Jere's land. It is across the fence from a neighbor's farm to the north which was given to my Grandfather John by his father, Leonard. It is my understanding that Great-grandfather Leonard gave his three children, Kate, Noah and John each a farm - just as Jere had given each of his children. The farm given to John is still in the family. It is presently owned by two granddaughters, Nancy Jane and Martha Sue. The latter, Martha Sue, makes the farm her home. The third daughter, Lucina, was born June 30, 1827. She married Cordell Tindall, a brother of Thomas, June 13, 1844. The farm given her by Jere is still in the family. It was owned by a great-great grandson, also named Cordell Tindall. Before his retirement, he had a distinguished career as an agricultural journalist. His daughter, Connie Tindall Shay, now owns and lives in the home.

Lavinia, daughter # 4, was born June 14,1829. On September 15, 1846 she married Thomas Carr Boggs. They had six children and for many years Boggs family members were prominent in the county and state. Fairview, the home they built and moved into in 1867 was one of Howard County's showplaces for more than 100 years. It was a center of social activities. The Boggs' farm adjoined one owned by Lavinia's brother, Leonard Kingsbury, who had married Thomas Boggs' sister, Catherine. The two families were very close.

Son Robert, born May 4,1831, was killed in a hunting accident when 12 years old.

Elizabeth Kate was born October 4, 1833. In 1857 she eloped with a cousin, William Greely Kingsbury. They lived for a number of years in Texas and later in Arizona. They had three children, all born in Texas.

Another daughter, Angeline, born July 15, 1836 died in infancy.

The last child, Mary, was born August 22. 1838, She married Lee Kenworthy August 11, 1856. They made their way to Napa, California and had three children. With the passage of years, communication apparently broke down with their descendants, if any.

Jere's Funeral Service

Jere's funeral was held at Mount Pleasant Baptist Church on April 7th. The sermon was delivered by Rev. L.K. Buckner, Jere was buried beside his first wife in the Mount Pleasant Cemetery. I have no detailed account of the funeral service, I assume because of the large extended family and his wide acquaintanceship that the church was crowded with people there to pay their respects to Jere and hear Rev. Buckner. I think it quite possible one or more of the songs named in my Uncle Lilburn's Boonville Daily News column of 5, September 1972 may have been sung. The column discusses the "Funeral Songs" which appeared in a hymnal published in 1842. Lilburn wrote: ... It "the hymnal" contains the words with no music, of 697 songs. There were no musical instruments used in churches then. One wonders why they were considered instruments of the devil. The preacher was usually the song leader. After announcing the hymns he would read aloud a couple of lines. (It was called "lining it.") The congregation would join him in singing them. Not everyone had a hymn book.

Funeral songs in the 1840s suggested unpleasant problems for body and soul of one who departed from this world:

"And must this body die, the well wrought form decay? And must these active limbs of mine, lie mouldering in the clay? Corruption, earth and worms shall but refine the flesh. Till my triumphant spirit comes to put it on afresh.

Am I born to die and lay this body down? And must my trembling spirit fly into a world unknown?

Who can resolve the doubt that tears my breast? Shall I be with the damned cast out or numbered with the blest?

Must I from God be driven or with my Savior dwell? Must come at his command to Heaven or else depart to Hell?"

Undoubtedly, the Rev. Buckner was able to answer the questions posed by the hymns with a stirring exposition of the kind of life one must lead in order to be passed through the Pearly Gates and admitted to Heaven. I think it a given that Buckner eulogized Jere Kingsbury as a loyal husband, loving father, good neighbor, man of integrity and devout Christian, who, though mourned by all who knew him, would be welcomed into Heaven as a good and faithful servant of the Lord.

In memory of Jere his children and second wife erected the impressive obelisk which marks his grave in Mount Pleasant Cemetery. Many of Jere's descendants also have been lovingly placed to rest in this beautiful setting. May the thirtieth is still Decoration Day at Mount Pleasant, as living Boonslickians lovingly spread flowers on the graves of the departed.

Jere's Bequests

To his widow, Mary, Jere bequeathed the following:

"One-half of household and kitchen furniture or the proceeds thereof, also my buggy and any horse she shall choose, also a Negro girl named Jane or Franky. also $1500 in cash, these to be hers absolutely. In case she is the longest liver, also I set apart $5000 in bank stock for her benefit. She is to have the interest on it paid to her during her life and at her decease, said bank stock to go one half to William Jewell College and the other half to Mount Pleasant College [Huntsville] as endowment funds."

Before her death the bank stocks through failure of the institutions had become worthless.

In a letter to an older first cousin, Lillian Kingsbury Agnew, in Great Falls, Montana, 16 July, 1934. Lilburn wrote:

"I have snatched some moments from corn-hogging in Fayette to delve into the old court records. Grandfather Jere's will interested me, and I thoroughly enjoyed his opulence. His executors were bonded for $250,000 so I presume the estate must have been appraised for at least half that sum, and he had already given his children over forty thousand dollars.

"The balance of the estate, worth more than $ 100,000, after he had already given his children land and cash benefits worth over $40,000, was to be divided among them equally. To the sons, he left their shares outright 'to do as he pleases with it. 'But, quoting from the will 'that part going to my daughters is to be set apart and loaned out and secured by real estate, or taken in bank stock or stocks of the government for their benefit, the interest to be paid to them when it becomes due, during their natural lives; the interest they will get will be better than land or Negroes, they can at all times have a pocketful of money. My object in putting the money at interest instead of giving it to my daughters, is that they shall never come to want, mankind nowadays are fond of speculating and often fail. A man, instead of complaining ought to be thankful that he has a wife that will bring him $500.00 or $1000.00 yearly.' (Will in private records of Howard County). "It is dated January 15, 1852."