James G. Tucker

An interesting communication written in 1915 by James G. Tucker of the early settlement is as follows:

"I was born in Indiana about fourteen miles from Greencastle, November 8, 1824. When quite young I moved with my parents to Illinois and settled on the Mackinaw River about fifteen miles from Bloomington, where father built a mill.

"In the spring of 1841 we started to Missouri in company with J. S. Allen, W. R. Allen, Ephraim Stewart, John W. Brown, Thomas Brown, C. L. Jennings, A. W. Allen and a young man named Reeves. The last two had no families.

"Our first stopping place in this county was with Beverly Travis, who was already located about five miles south of the present site of Bethany. I think John S. Allen remained with Beverly Travis and the rest of the company went north of Bethany and camped three-quarters of a mile east of the Jake King farm, upon which C. L. Jennings settled. W. R. Allen settled where we first camped. John W. Brown settled on the Cunniff farm. Thomas Brown bought out a squatter named Collins, who had settled on what was known for years as the David Travis place. My father, Thomas Tucker, settled on the farm known until recently as the Johnson Hogan farm. Ephraim Stewart settled the Madison Buck farm and John S. Allen settled on the William T. Buck farm. A. W. Allen afterward went to Dunkerson's Grove, where he married. I never knew what became of young Reeves.

"Of all that company of men, women and children who came in our wagon train in 1841 to Missouri, save Emaline Templeman (daughter of John S. Allen), Mary Phillebaum, my sister Lizzie and myself. Those who had preceded us and were living in this neighborhood though somewhat scattered were Sharp Winningham, Isaac Cheney, Beverly Travis, George Williams, Phillip Harris, Henry Fuller and _____ Collins.

"When we came to this county we suffered the privations common to all pioneers. In those days the "gritter" was a blessing to mankind, and the coffee mill did noble service, for it not only ground the precious coffee but many a time ground our buckwheat. After a year or two Thomas Taylor started a horse-mill near Halleck's farm, which ran for several years.

"The first school I attended was taught by Willis Allen in a log cabin near Allen Dale's house. The next year John W. Brown taught. Teachers usually boarded around. I don't know what they were paid for their services, but I do know that they licked me every day, but it was no more than my share, I guess. (This was the grandfather of Frank Morris Frisby, they looked much alike and from that last statement were, when boys, I presume, much alike.-Ed.)

"There were plenty of Indians, deer and turkey. The Indians passed through our settlement often and camped on the creek near us. They would come to Sharp Winningham's to buy pork. They were always peaceable. They traded furs and venison hams for our produce.

"The winter of '41 my father and Lossing Jennings took the contract to erect a log ice house at Liberty, Missouri. They were there a couple of months. They went down afoot and came back the same way, each carrying a pack of sugar, coffee and domestic. An unusually heavy snow storm began before they arrived at home. That snow stayed on all the rest of the winter, more than a foot deep all the time. Soon after returning from Liberty my father engaged to split rails for Sharp Winningham for fifty cents a hundred. Father never stopped short of his hundred a day and often he made more and took it out in meat at $1.50 per hundred pounds.

"My sister, Neaty, married David Carton and settled west of Bethany, where she lived until her death six years ago. A narrow trail or footpath which one might travel on horseback ran from our settlement, northeast of Bethany, diagonally southwest past the old graveyard, the J. S. Allen home and Cornelison's store, the post office, following the slope to the falls, where Big Creek was forded, as was also West Big Creek north of Bob Nelson's house, and finally stopped at Sister Neaty's house. This path ran through heavy timber most of the way and the underbrush was very thick, especially where the first survey of Bethany was laid out. Sister Neaty died in 1909 after the big flood, when most of the bridges were carried away. The funeral cortege bearing her remains was compelled to ford the creek at the falls, as she had done hundreds of times sixty-odd years ago.

"We attended meetings at Phil Harris's house which was led by John S. Allen and George Flint. We always went in the ox wagon. In those days everybody went to meeting and they seemed to like it. My mother was very devout and it was a common saying among the settlers that "No woman had a greater faith in the Redeemer than Aunt Betty Tucker." My sister, Lizzie, and I thought nothing of riding twenty miles on horseback to Pilot Grove, Daviess County, and get there in time for eleven o'clock service.

"After about two years my father rented Harris's mill on Big Creek. The log house and mill stood on the west side of the creek at the Slaughter Bridge. Part of the old dam is yet to be seen when the water is low. My brother, John, and I tended a corn crop on the hill east of the creek and we waded the water on the bottom to our knees every day that summer to get to our corn. Father ran the mill two or three years, Phil Harris having gone to Oregon.

"We lived at the mill when the county court was organized in 1845. My mother cooked the dinner that day for the first county judges. The meeting was held under two large trees that stood close together, a linn and an elm. I have done many a washing under those two trees. My mother wasn't very strong and the washing fell on me. Though my mother was not very robust she served her day and generation as best she could. Doctors were few and their practice ranged from the Iowa line to Gallatin, consequently their labors were onerous. On the advent of the numerous offspring in most of the families for miles around my mother was sent for and was ever found the present help in time of trouble. Sometimes she would be gone from home for days at a time, having been called from one case to another. In some families having from twelve to fifteen children my mother was present at every birth. She rode a large white horse named Selah and that horse and its rider were anxiously watched for and gladly welcomed, both at the house of sickness and at home when they returned.

"When I was fourteen years of age a doctor (I can't recall his name) practicing medicine in Bethany, ran out of medicine. He wanted someone to go to Saint Joseph to get a supply. I agreed to go. I rode a two year old filly and made the trip in three days. There wasn't a single house from Gentryville to Third Fork (near Union Star). I stayed at old Mr. Miller's house on Third Fork the first night. The second day I went to Saint Joseph, got my medicine and back to Mr. Miller's for the second night, then on home by the third night.

"When my father moved from the Hams mill he moved to the Alvord place in the south part of Bethany. We built a log house eighteen by twenty feet with an addition sixteen by sixteen feet. I hauled all the logs from west of Big Creek, where Uncle Sammy Clayton lived. We afterwards built a log barn and a large crib with a threshing floor between, which was twenty by twenty feet. This was the first threshing floor in the neighborhood and people came for miles around to thresh their grain here. Threshing grain on this floor was a vast improvement over threshing on the ground. It came out so much cleaner and the bread was so much whiter.

"My father sold a horse for $40 that would sell now for $175, and a yoke of oxen for $21 and delivered them to Pattonsburg to get money to enter the quarter section which included the Alvord place. A part of that tract was laid off in town lots and known as Tucker's first and second additions. Later other parts were laid off in the Carton, Heaston, King, Nordyke and Elmwood additions.

"My father died in 1872 at the age of seventy-seven and my mother died in 1883 at the age of seventy-eight. After an absence of thirty years the return to the scenes of my youth and manhood is fraught with pleasure in meeting so many old time friends, though saddened with sorrow at the loss of my life companions who shared those scenes and memories for nearly sixty years."

The above letter was written in 1915. The writer was well acquainted with Mr. Tucker, and on his advent to this county in 1878 made his home at the Elmo Hotel, then kept by Mr. Tucker.

Mr. Tucker's wife was Rhoda Howell, a daughter of Marshall K. Howell, and Mrs. Eva Frisby, wife of Hon. Ezra H. Frisby, is their daughter. 

 Harrison County| AHGP Missouri

Source: History of Harrison County, Missouri, by Geo. W. Wanamaker, Historical Publishing Company, Topeka, 1921