FAMILY HISTORY: POETRY Collection written by Elsie Strawn ARMSTRONG
  
  File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Les Howard Strawn
  
  Copyright 2006.  All rights reserved.
  http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm
  http://www.usgwarchives.net/pa/somerset/
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         CHAPTER THIRTEENTH
  
  I heard of a good claim,
      On the river down below,
  I thought the first good chance I got,
      To see it I would go.
  
  My sons were making rails,
      And the horses then were idle,
  And then I took a horse,
      My saddle and my bridle;
  
  And got upon the horse's back
      And rode away alone,
  There were plenty then of Indians,
      But there I saw no stone.
  
  I rode around upon the claim,
      And stopped and looked to see
  How it might appear
      When improved, it came to be.
  
  But I thought it would not suit me,
      It did not fill my mind,
  And to ride upon the river
      I felt myself inclined.
  
  So I turned up the river,
      And rode along the shore,
  While my mind was still prospecting,
      This new country to explore.
  
  As I rode up the river,
      On the shore at my left hand,
  Exactly on the spot where
      Lacon now doth stand,
  
  I came to a little pen,
      It was five or six feet square,
  And I sprung upon the ground
      To see what might be there.
  
  There was a hole on either side
      Through which the light shown in,
  And there were five dead Indians
      A sitting in that pen.
  
  There was one in every corner,
      And they looked firm and sound,
  But the one set in the middle,
      His head lay on the ground.
  
  With their blankets round their shoulders
      And their hunting tools all on,
  Ready to start a hunting,
      With their hands upon their guns.
  
  I was told they had a frolic,
      An Indian 'jollification', 
  And in that drunken frolic
      They did commit that depredation.
  
  I stood there in solemn awe,
      To see the red man's fate;
  O! The fire Water!  Truly
      How much we should it hate.
  
  Destroyer of the Natives,
      And of ten thousand more,
  A part of all the emigrants
      From every clime and shore.
  
  And then to hunt a claim,
      I rode no further out,
  But went straight to my home,
      And had enough to think about.
  
  A hunting for a claim
      I went no more alone,
  And still was looking out
      For water and for stone.
  
  I was on the hunt for timber,
      And when I came in sight,
  Well now! I have surely found it,
      There is timber about right.
  
  But when I came near,
      It would seem to disappear,
  And when I was riding through it
      The timber was not there.
  
  Sometimes, take with me one son,
      And again I'd take the others,
  And once I rode five days.
      With my two youngest brothers.
  
  We looked carefully on the south side,
      Up the rapids of the river,
  And then went down the north side
      To see what we could discover.
  
  When we were coming back
      On the north side of the river,
  William Carr along with us,
      And my two youngest brothers.
  
  When we came to the Comsagen,
      Near the middle of the day,
  One spoke and said, "This is
      A great place for making hay."
  
  Comsagen bottom's rich
      And the grass grew high upon it,
  I took some grass in either hand
      And tied across my bonnet.
  
  While sitting on my horse
      Full sixteen hands high,
  For this is kind of wild grass,
      Looks very much like rye.
  
  I went once more to hunt a claim,
      And took my oldest son,
  We found a spot we thought would do
      To go to work upon.
  
  Not far below the mouth of Fox,
      Salt marsh and building stone,
  Stone, coal, timber, and living springs,
      I hoped to feel at home.
  
  When we moved up, my children sick,
      One had the bilious fever,
  And 'twas not long when all but John
      Were sick with fever and ague.
  
  One day when all were sick,
      And the fever raging high,
  Can no one bring some water,
      Water, O, some water, was the cry.
  
  I took a small tin pail,
      And thought that I would try
  To bring my children water,
      Though my fever raged so high.
  
  I was so weak and blind
      I could not keep the way,
  But blundered off the path,
      That bright, sunshiny day.
  
  As I was coming back,
      Walking up a rise of ground,
  It seemed all hills and holes,
      So I came near tumbling down.
  
  We were invited in a house
      And were told that we could stay
  Till it suited our convenience,
      And wished to go away.
  
  The house was just one mile
      From where we wished to build,
  And I thought we best go in it,
      As the folks were so good willed.
  
  Before it was a month
      The host came there one day,
  And said the house was wanted,
      And we must move away.
  
  John tried to get a house built,
      And worked with all his might,
  He worked while he could see
      And did the chores at night.
  
  And when he got all ready,
      The timber on the ground,
  He invited all the neighbors    
      For more than ten miles around.
  
  There were so many sick,
      And the inhabitants so few,
  He could not get his house up,
      After all that he could do.
  
  He moved for men to help him raise,
      But then he moved in vain,
  For he could not get it up,
      Tho' he tried and tried again.
  
  We were obliged to move
      Five miles another way,
  And we could not get back
      Till after New Year's Day.
  
  My children had got well,
      And they raised a lot of men,
  And got one end up and covered,
      And we moved in it then.
  
  There were boards upon the sleepers,
      And a hole left for the smoke,
  And clapboards for a hearth
      Until the winter broke.
  
  John started to Ohio in eighteen thirty-one
      The eighteenth of November,
  That winter most severe,
      And that I well remember.
  
  But they went to making rails
      With a seeming new ambition,
  And after we'd all been sick
      We used quantities of provision.
  
  First they built the chimney,
      And then they laid the hearth,
  And some were making fence,
      Some breaking up the earth.
  
  That ground was in good case
      That year to raise a crop,
  And we just had got it planted
      When our work we had to stop.
  
  For we were all a striving,
      Anxious to get in some seed,
  And then to leave our work,
      With reluctance we agreed.
  
  When I was sowing seed,
      Our hired man did say,
  "The seed that you put in now
      You surely throw away.
  
  "It never can come up,
      It will perish in the ground,
  You can't expect to see it up
      When frost, the earth has bound."