Thursday, January 22, 1897
THE HOLLANDERS who settled New York are well-known to our school children. Miles Standish, the Mayflower and Plymouth Rock are perhaps more familiar to our teachers and their pupils than Bible stories. But of their own ancestors, who they were, what they did, what they suffered and what influence the work of their arms and brains had upon the destinies of the American nation, is virtually a blank page to them. It is to be hoped that all this will be changed in due time, that attention will be so directed to this subject of historical investigation, that our people will become acquainted with ancestral history, that they will try to perpetuate the influence of their worthy fathers and keep in mind and practice their principles.
AN INTERESTING MANUSCRIPT
In 1822, Alexander Campbell, ancestor of the Campbells of Highland county, returned from a stay of three years in Howard County, Missouri, to his old home near the head of Jackson’s River, then Pendleton county, Va. The property is now owned by George Dudley.
His wife, Margaret Brown, of Augusta county, died on the journey back while passing through Indiana. James Campbell, one of the sons kept a diary of their journey and describes very minutely the details of each day’s progress.
August 10, 1822, the party crossed Locust Creek on a “rotten crazy bridge,” and camped a mile beyond Jordan’s, near which was a camp-meeting going on, which the party attended. “There was a large crowd and much stir among the people.”
August 11th, Sunday morning, up very early and started, but not before a large company of people from the camp-meeting had gathered to see the tame elk that was brought from Missouri. Upon passing Major Poage’s, he came out and went with the party about a mile to hear the news from Missouri. They came to Cackley’s, and failed to get grain, and then went on to the forks of the road, where they camped, and succeeded in getting some sheaf oats from William Cackley.
Thence they passed up Beaver Creek, camped at Cumming’s, then past Bradshaw’s (Huntersville), up through the gap, “which was very rocky,” and camped at the “Lockridge place.”
Thence to John Moore’s and camped. The next day passed Levi Moore’s, fed at “The Cabins,” and in the evening reached Back Creek.
“Here everything looked familiar.” Kind friends had heard of their homecoming, and had swept and garnished the premises, and welcomed their old neighbors back again.
All this was very consoling to the father and his motherless sons, after the wearisome journey and the sad vicissitudes of the past three years.
With a covered wagon and seven horses and a tame elk, Mr. Campbell, eight sons and two or three other persons, traveled a thousand miles.
They ferried the deep rivers, had steep hills to climb, rugged roads to pass over, and spent most of the nights camping by the wayside. All the particulars are graphically recorded in the diary kept by James, the eldest son, then a youth about twenty years of age.
Miss Mattie Campbell and others are putting the interesting contents of the worn and faded manuscript into a form for preservation and it will be read with increasing interest as the years go by.
SEELEY TRIAL
Of course, none of us Pocahontas people have been reading the accounts of what is known as the Seeley trial, in New York, in the Sherry restaurant.
If we have been, we should be ashamed to acknowledge it; for it gives the reader a glimpse into the rapid life of New York City, and it is wondered if Rome in its most licentious days, or even Sodom and Gomorrah, could hold a candle to the goings on that characterize the society people of New York.
Seeley, a grandson of P. T. Barnum, gave a dinner for his brother in honor of his approaching marriage, and gave orders to a dramatic agent to place a show on a stage in the dining room.
It seems that there was too much shown. The agent in the form of Mephistopheles approached the actresses, and, arguing on the grounds that to the drunk all things are pure, got them to make sad exhibitions of themselves.
A visit by the police captain of the precinct enables all of the guests to appear in court and do what they can to show that the bounds of propriety were not overstepped.