SETTLING
IN MINNESOTA
After their long journey from the east coast, our ancestors were faced with settling on Americaıs frontier. Those who arrived in the 1840s, mainly Norwegians, first settled in southeast Wisconsin before moving to Minnesota during the 1850ıs. . Those arriving a decade later moved directly into southern Minnesota. Once again, there is a chart showing their arrival in Minnesota as well as a map that establishes some background for this article.
A previous article describes
how our ancestors traveled to Minnesota.
However, once they were at the Mississippi River any modern mode of
travel ended. If they had traveled
by paddlewheel up the river they embarked on the western bank of the
river. Those who traveled by land
or rail through southern Wisconsin faced a different problem, how to cross the
river.
Early
in the spring of 1856 the family started west with seven ox teams. At the Mississippi River they ran into
trouble. Their wagons were not
equipped with brakes,
so
it was necessary that they use chains to keep the wheels from turning to act as
brakes coming down the bluffs on the east side. They had only four chains, enough to tie the wheels on one
wagon, to come down the bluff, to cross the river somewhere between LaCrosse
and Winona, tie extra oxen to the wagon and pull it up the west side toward
Rochester, unhook and return with the chains and oxen for another wagon. It took two days per wagon for the
crossing. (Kanne, Miniske, Marzarn Family Tree)
The above information is from
the genealogy on the Kanne family. The article mentions that there were
approximately 25 people in five wagons.
Thus it is easy to assume that it took at least 10 days just to cross
the river.
Once on land west of the
Mississippi reaching their homesteads required travel on overland trails and
footpaths. Arriving either by foot
or by wagon these pioneers had little except what they could carry. A History of Waseca County by
James Child continues the story.
They
were little used to the ways of the country or the mode of travel, and were six
weeks on the road, reaching Iosco, the 25th of May, 1856. The country, as is generally the case in early spring, was wet and
the sloughs soft, and some days they had to double teams, and in some places
they had to put all the teams to one wagon, often breaking chains and have a
rough time generally.
A typical story is told by another
one of our forefathers, Thomas Barden. The young family had traveled by rail
and river to Hastings before moving onward to St. Marys Township in Waseca
County by an ox-drawn wagon. They arrived with one cow, six chickens, a dog, a
breaking plow, a small stock of provisions and 25 cents in their pockets. It is
found in the History of Waseca County by Child.
We
had come from Hastings by wagon and and, although the weather was cool and raw,
we had to sleep under the wagon at night in order to save money to buy feed for
the oxen, and, as I said before, our money was all gone when we reached St.
Marys except for twenty-five cents. Of course we had to stop there. We made inquiry for vacant land, and
found a vacant eight on section five, in Wilton township. We immediately filed on it, and went to
work to break up the sod, to plant corn, potatoes and beans. This work had to
be done before we could think of a house and during that time we lived
outdoors; often the rain poured down upon us during the night while in bed and
then everything had to be spread out and dried in the sunshine
I
tell you it was a sad change for the young wife to move from the heart of
Yankeedom where everything was as nice as a pumpkin pie to such an outdoor
place as that was - and the half will never be told - it was bad enough to be
living thus exposed to the elements but that was not the worst of it - we were
living on the border of the Winnebago Indian Reservation and one day, lo and
behold, we received a visit from eight to ten Indians, the first Mrs. Barden
had ever seen. They were dressed
in breechcloths and feathers and carried guns and knives. She thought her time had come but it
hadn't, They looked about awhile
and then left.
There
was only one thing that saved me from destruction and that was that Mrs. Barden
belonged to the Catholic Church and you know there is no divorce allowed by
that. She certainly had causes
enough for divorce for taking her to such a place but she 'broke in' all right
and soon became a heroic pioneer.
The Kanne story of their first
few months is very similar to the Barden story.
Some
of them immediately staked homesteads and set to work to build homes, plant
garden vegetables, potatoes, and corn.
It was also necessary that they plow up twenty acres of each claim to
prove their right to it before receiving title from the government. Due to the delay in crossing the
Mississippi River They were later
in planting their gardens than expected and ran into a food shortage the first
summer before harvesting their crops.
In order to stretch their meager supply, after the potatoes were
growing, a knife was sued to dig down alongside of the shoot and remove the
potato used as see. These were
then boiled and used as food.
Later potato vines were tried but found unpalatable. (Child, History of Waseca County)
Once again please remember that
our ancestors were pioneers. Many
times they were the first in a new area.
It was their job to clear the land, break the prairie soil, and build
shelter for their families and animals.
First
Homes Top
Thomas Barden recounts his
first home.
We
had no money, no lumber, no nails, but there was plenty of timber. I got a good set of logs and the kind
neighbors helped me raise my house, as was the fashion, you remember; and the
last money went for something to drink, for in those days we thought it not
lucky to raise a house without something to moisten the throat. (Child, History of Waseca County)
An article from a website
expands on this story.
In
the first the housing was very simple, many dug into a hill, built with logs in
the front, put a door in the middle of the wall, a little window on one side,
another on the other side of the door, made a fireplace in the other end, and
lived there for several years until they had the means to build better.
Getting
a roof over your head was one thing, but there was more to do, there were
provision to obtain and for those who had a big family, this demanded a great
deal of time. There were few here who had anything to hire workers for, and
only a few of those who had come so far, that they had to harvest their own.
The pay was at 50 cents per day for ordinary work, 75 cents for haying, $1.00
in harvest, but the pay did provide something to live off, flour 2 cents a
pound, meat 20 cents etc. In the evenings the women sat and spun by firelight.
The men made axe handles, repaired shoes and clothes and made fun of those who
spun. Bed clothing was woven of linen.
We
lived well and were well satisfied, had good health and everyone wished to get
ahead and none wished to go back. It took a longer time before we normally had
cook stoves, but the fireplace was used for cooking. It took money to buy a
stove, and we were so far from the market.
The
Norwegians used a great deal of flat bread, and also we had what they called
bread pots, that the dough was placed in, and these had an iron cover and they
were placed in the fire and the glowing coals were laid around the bottom and
on top and they were baked, and father made the hole in the fireplace and
mother baked delicious wheat bread.
Everyone
lived as much as possible of what they harvested and each one had his own corn
and wheat milled.
The
first years, the wheat was threshed by laying the sheaves in a circle and
walking the oxen over them, whereby the wheat was tramped out. This was done on
a frozen field in the fall. But everyone worked in the hope of improvement,
which came little by little. It was a long way to the mill at first and with
very poor roads, and there were no bridges over the creeks so we had to travel
long detours to get there. When we finally got to the mill, it was often full
of others waiting, so everyone had to wait their turn. On these trips we often
got stuck in swamps and we had to carry the load over and empty the wagon to
get it out again.
It
could be a great advantage for the young, who are growing up now, to see how
hard their forefathers had things to get through life so their descendants
could have things better, which also happened. It will then be understood that
the daily work was done to bring all the necessaries for an earthly life, but
in the evenings and Sundays, it was not forgotten to instill in the young
Christian teaching and faith in the life after this one.
www.valdressamband.org/archive/emigrants
Thomas Barden tells a similar tale of his first attempts to raise successful crops.
My
first experience with wheat raising was not very flattering. I sowed six bushels of club wheat in
the spring. The next fall we
cleaned a spot near the stack, and when the ground was frozen we went at it
with a flail. After two or three
days we got it threshed. We had no
fanning mills then, so we waited until the wind blew and then cleaned our
immense crop. I had just six
bushels of very smutty wheat. I
took it to the mill and had ti ground.
When I got home the good wife was overjoyed with the prospects of some
good biscuits; but disappointment is the lot of man and, in this case, of
woman; for when the biscuits were baked they were black as the ace of spades,
with smut, and we had to fall back on corn cakes and mush.
Well, the next year wheat was a great deal better and more to the acre. Some people complain that wheat is cheap now, but in 1859-60, we used to haul it thirty miles to Faribault, and sell it for forty cents a bushel; if we hauled it to Hastings , sixty-five miles, we used to get from fifty-five to sixty cents a bushel. It took us from five to six days to make the Hastings trip with oxen. We were compelled to sleep under our wagons nights, and sometimes it rained or snowed on us. Times may be hard now for the tender-footed, but they are not what used to was. (Child)
The Kanne party has a similar story of their first year of farming the new land .
The
next spring we brought seed wheat, Scotch fife, near Morristown, for which we
paid $2 a bushel. The crop was a
light one. We got only forty
bushels, having harvested it with a cradle and threshed it on the frozen ground
with flails. This we saved mostly
for seed the next year. The next
yearıs crop, that of 1858, was almost a total failure. Our corn crop that year was middling
good, and we had a good crop of vegetables, so we had to fall back on corn for
bread. (Child)
The Great Sioux Uprising Top
When someone my age thinks of pioneers the thoughts of Indians often enters the picture. Our ancestors did have contact with Native Americans. When they arrived in the area of Waseca County the western edge was part of the Winnebago Indian Reservation. The Winnebago were originally found in southeastern Wisconsin. However, the tribe had participated in a series of wars and in 1832 was forced, through government trickery, to cede all their lands east of the Mississippi.
Several of our ancestors had contact with the Winnebago. My mother remembers the Bardens talking about the Indians appearing at their home seeking sugar. Perhaps the best story is of the Bardens is told in A History of Waseca County. Settling on land bordering the Reservation, Thomas went on their land to cut wood. The next day several Winnebago visited the family. In trying to communicate with the Irish-speaking Bardens, they were finally were forced to give up. The Indians left with this message: You dumb Norwegian, I will soon take you to a place where you will speak English.
Following the Sioux Uprising the government in 1862 once again forced the Winnebago to move to South Dakota and the land was opened to white settlers. The tribe finally settled in Nebraska.
I do not know if or how the Winnebago participated in the Uprising of 1862. In A History of Waseca County, an article on John Murphy, the husband of Bridget Culliton, states that
the
Winnebagoes were not hostile unless they were intoxicated. The great fear at that time was that
the excitement would cause an uprising among this tribe, but during he Indian
massacre the Winnebagoes in the country never caused any trouble.
The Uprising did have an indirect effect on our ancestors so we should take a look at it. The following is taken from an Atlas of the Sioux Wars. The U.S. Army wrote it. and I believe it paints an accurate picture of the situation.
these
tribes were nomadic hunters, and their primary food staple was meat, especially
buffalo. As settlers intensified their occupation of the Sioux hunting grounds,
the Indians' nomadic hunting culture became doomed. Since warfare was a central
part of their culture, it is easy to understand why these Indians would not
readily give up their way of life. It would take force of arms to seize and
occupy the Sioux lands. The acquisitive American settlers opposing the Indians
also had warfare as a central theme of their culture. As a result, the stage
was set for long periods of violence, only intermittently broken by peace,
until one side achieved permanent dominance.
By
1862, the Santee Sioux had given up their traditional homelands, which
comprised most of southern Minnesota, in exchange for a narrow reservation on
the southern bank of the Minnesota River. As compensation for their lands, the
Sioux were to receive cash annuities and supplies that would enable them to
live without the resources from their traditional hunting grounds. Because of
administrative delays, however, both the cash and food had not arrived by the
summer of 1862. Crop failures the previous fall made the late food delivery
particularly distressing to the Indians. Encroachment by settlers on
reservation land and the unfair practices of many American traders also fueled
Sioux suspicions and hatred. Furthermore, the Sioux were emboldened by the
Minnesotans' relative weakness, brought on by the departure of many of their
young men to fight in the Civil War. This combination of hunger, hatred, and
the perceived weakness of the Minnesotans and the local military created an
explosive situation that needed only a spark to bring on a full-scale war.
http://www.cgsc.army.mil/carl/resources
Most of the action in the Sioux Uprising took place west of the areas where our ancestors lived. Most of the action occurred within the Minnesota River Valley.
However the fear that it might spread forced many of our ancestors to move their families back
to
Faribault where they lived in the basement of the Catholic Church until the
scare was over. The men folks
returned and hoarded their homes as best they could during the day. About twenty of them would spend the
nights together so that they could put up some defense in case they were
attacked. Fortunately, no harm
ever befell them.
One of our ancestors directly participated in the Uprising. Gullick Knutson served with the First Minnesota Mounted Rangers, Company B. He was described as a brave and faithful soldier upon his discharge in 1863.
Civil War Top
The Souix Uprising of 1862 was actually a small chapter in the great saga known as the Civil War. Besides this action with the Sioux, several of our ancestors took part in the epic struggle itself. All fought on the side of the North. The following table summarizes that participation.
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Ancestor |
Regiment |
Action |
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Christian Sutter |
Company H, 100th Regiment, Illinois Infantry |
Chattanoga, Chickamuaga, Lookout Mountain, Missionary Ridge, Nashville and many others |
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Torgus Hagen |
Company C, 5th Minnesota Infantry |
Cornith, Vicksburg, Nashville and many others |
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Gilbert Kinn |
Company K, 1st Regiment, Heavy Artillery Volunteers |
Vicksburg, Atlanta and many others |
In addition to these three ancestors who physically served and surrived the War, we also lost two great uncles. Benjamin Sutter, the brother of Christian, died at the battle of Nashville, and John Barden, a member of Company D, 19th Massachusetts Infantry and the brother of Thomas, died on Sept 4, 1864 in northern Georgia.
These wars certainly had an impact on our ancestors. However, at the other end of the spectrum, so did the church. Many of our ancestors played an important role in their church. Anders Nelson, a Swede, joined with several Norwegians to form the North Waseca Lutheran Church. A.K. Lee, Seivert Hagen, and Gullick Knutson were also prominent members in the congregation. The Webers and Bauers are among the founding families of the German / Trinity Evangelical Lutheran Church of North Morristown. The Borchardts were charter members of the Bethlehem Lutheran Church in Morristown itself. Church records at St. Marys Catholic Church are filled with various members of the Conways, Cullitons, and Barden families. The Culliton and Barden families had several children enter into religious life, including two priests and at least 6 nuns. This is a strong indication of the importance of religion within all these families.
W\Thus, with the help of God, our ancestors faced the hard life of the Minnesota frontier. It seemed to bring out the best in these pioneers. I find it interesting how many of them came to America with nothing but were considered successful citizens in their later years. Many were classified in their obituaries as wealthy, prosperous, and well-to-do, all within years of their arrival in the new land. At the time of their deaths, Ernest Meyer owned 560 acres of land, Anders Nelson owned nearly 340 acres, A.K. Lee possessed 292 acres, and Thomas Barden owned several buildings in Waseca. Their dedication and hard work helped build southern Minnesota into what it is today. We continue to build on this hard work.
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