The companion of your choice

During the summer of 1855, sickness prevailed in almost all sections of Kansas. Cholera and malaria or "ague" were endemic. The ague was especially prevalent in the region where James Griffing traveled in July -- along the Marais des Cygnes and Osage rivers. It has been written that when John Brown, the old abolitionist, arrived in Kansas Territory in October, 1855, he found all of his sons afflicted with the disease on their claims near North Middle Creek, a tributary of the Marais des Cygnes.

Predictably, James Griffing contracted the ague shortly after returning to the vicinity of Topeka. The following letter, written from James Goodrich to his sister Augusta, reveals the details of James' illness.

I received yours and [my brother] Steve's letter last Friday but I didn't get the [news]papers. I really don't know what day of the month it is. James Griffing says it is August but I can't believe it is so late. It is the shortest year to me that I ever new. I get up in the morning when I wake up, cook my breakfast and go to work till I get hungry, go to get my dinner and then go to work and work till night, and then I quit to get my supper and then turn in and sleep as sound as a pig. One night the wolves wake me up howling round my cabin but I was so sleepy I didn't mind it. I see [the wolves] almost every day but I don't mind anything about them and I never can get near enough to shoot them. They will run off 20 or 30 rods and turn round and look at you and, if you go towards them, they will run. My neighbor, Mr. Hubbard, said that one came round his house one night and he got up and loaded his gun and then he couldn't see him -- they aren't very savage.

James Griffing has been up here almost two weeks. He is sick at [his brother] Henry's now. He is not very sick but [sick enough] so he can't go to his appointment today which is some 15 miles from here. He has been very busy making fence on his claim and work pretty hard. He has staid up here with me but he has gone down there to be docterd. He is going to put up a house before he goes east. I guess he is going to let it out by the job. He wants to start the middle of this month for Woodstock [Illinois] and then home [to Owego, New York]. He has sold his claim on the Wakarusa for a hoss and the hoss for a lot in Lawrence which he thinks will be worth considerable in the course of a few years. His claim down there was all bottom land and he didn't like it. His claim here is about 3 miles from here and about 2 each from Topeka and about the same from Tecumseh. It is right on the road. His corn wont be much I guess. The cattle got in and eat a good deal of it up and it didn't come up very good. He preaches here in Topeka every 4 weeks. When he is up here, he lives with me.

I make some of the nicest johnycake I ever eight and I have boiled beans and baked as good as anybody. I have a bake kettle and I take the cover and heat it and put it on my frying pan and bake as good as I want. The way you fri pork, I guess that I fried it so first. [Henry's wife] Nancy told me how to do it and I did so and like it.

Mr. Hubbard has been here this morning and he thinks of going to the gold diggings about 300 miles from here. He says there is several going from Topeka there. They are going with teams and take provisions enough to last them 6 months. He has got a claim but no improvement on it but will leave it he says. If I never had no improvements on my claim, I believe I should go to. He has [heard] of one man making $6,000 in a little while. Henry says that I am doing the best of any the young men around that he has seen. He has been up here this morning and said that he wished Pa could see my corn. It grows finely and some of it is as tall as I am almost. I don't know what has got into the men in Topeka -- they are most all going to leave. But I shall stick it [out] a little while longer.

I shall have a good many cucumbers if it is wet and I shall pick some and let you and Jim have some if you want any. Nancy says she won't give you a thing out of the garden. She is an old stingy gut -- that's so and no mistake! Henry came up to have me go to our neighbors to get some medicine for James about one mile from here. I took Jacob and saddled him and went over there and got some for him. He has got the chill fever and is quite sick now. Says he had a chill this morning. I told him that I was going to write home today and he said that he has been taken down with the fever so that he could not go to his appointments which is the last round before conference.

Is George Stroup going to live in Rockford [Illinois] or where? I shall stay here a little while but if they are all going to leave, I shall leave to. They say that folks hear what [hard] times they have here and they won't come which is enough to discourage anybody from coming here to live now. You may make me some summer pants and some corse shirts if you will. I thought you made me a pare of stripe shirts but I have not got any in the trunk. I don't care about any white ones. I have kept on my old shirts all summer and my old pants and overalls and I am going to keep them on till [I get] my fence made -- which is dirty work. I can by a pare of shoes for a shilling but I don't want any now. But I shall get me a pare purty soon.

Yesterday James Griffing killed a rattle snake with 11 rattles on it. It was a large one. My toes are not sore -- the nales came off with the skin. I spose you don't pitty me for running so much but I don't care. I inquired the day of the month over to Mr. Chadwick's this morning and come to find out it is the 29th day of July but I dated this August so it won't make any difference to you. Has the horses run away agen? Tell Mr. Perkins he must stay there till I go home. I can't write anymore. I want to write to Stephen so goodbye. Write soon. From your Brother, -- James Goodrich

A short while after, James Griffing wrote to reassure Augusta that he was alright:

Seated on my bed with my writing on my lap, I write you a few lines. It has been over five weeks since I have received any line from you but think it must be owing to some derangement of the mail. And it has been now almost two weeks since I was at Lawrence so that, in all probability, there is [a letter waiting for me] there now. The last time [I went to the Post Office,] I found two [news]papers from yourself which were very acceptable.

[Your brother] James is doing well. If your folks should fall short in corn, I think from appearances [that] he will have plenty to supply them. His crop appears first rate if we can have rain. I should not wonder if he has between 180 and 200 bushels. He seems in quite good spirits. He talks of putting some [acreage] to wheat this fall and fencing a large lot for corn another year. His health appears better than I have ever known it before. He does not go about in all sections and has not been living for months on the bottoms like myself so that probably he nor Henry's family [will] be troubled with the chill fever. [Living] on the high rolling prairie [as they do will, no doubt, keep them healthy].

Several persons are putting up new buildings at Topeka and, at the same time, others are leaving for back in the states. Most that leave are a class that would not be of much worth here [anyway]. But Topeka does not keep pace with Lawrence. [Lawrence] is growing faster than any town south of the [Kansas] river. Emigration is dull at present, but I think the numbers coming in this fall and [next] spring will be unprecedented in the settlement of any state.

For a few days, I have been somewhat unwell. For the first time, I have had a regular attack of the chill fever. It comes on alternate days. It certainly is one of the most unpleasant species of sickness I ever experienced. The warm weather, hot fever, poor appetite, abundant perspiration, have reduced me in flesh considerable. The chill acts mainly and shakes me well as though I was a thing of no account. But I think I shall -- with care -- be able to master it. I was injudicious in not taking some antibilious medicines before I was attacked. I shall now be obliged to increase the doses. Were some water cure establishment near, how I should like to try that system of cure. No element seemed more desirable than an abundance of good cool water when the fever was raging. I am much better today -- able to be [up and] around. Tomorrow will be the regular day for my chill but I hope to forestall it. Should I succeed, I think I can be about my work again soon. [2] If health will allow, I hope to be able to start for the states about the 28th inst., but will probably not get there until toward the last of September.

The weather is most delightful -- cool breezes continually fanning one. But I almost think I have been disposed to dwell upon the sunny side of matters... 'No rose without its thorn.' There are many things that many do not take really into consideration in coming here from where they have been surrounded with every convenience. The houses are small. No lumber can be anywhere obtained -- only at an enormous price as the mills do not begin to supply the demand. Consequently, to come from a well-floored, well-roomed house [to] here, presents quite a contrast and makes a great difference in one's mode of life. Then it takes some little time to get surrounded with suitable conveniences. Society is not so settled and villages are far less abundant. Neighbors are generally more distant, rattlesnakes and other snakes more abundant, wolves are more abundant, and Indians are occasionally about. The Missourians are scarce -- only about election time -- and homesick persons are every now and then around. Every variety of provisions here are not so abundant as in the states. Crickets grow larger and sing in a more moanful manner. Spiders grow very large also and one species is said to be poisonous to the bite. Flies are almost as thick as they are [back] East but more gentlemanly in their deportment (as I cannot now remember seeing one light on a single plastered wall or paper ceiling since I have been in the territory!) -- but some of them know how to bite.

[My brother] Henry can get no barrel for his cucumbers. [His wife] Nancy might have pickled several barrels if she had the materials. She has, however, picked them off, given away [some] to neighbors, eaten some, and wasted many. Her tomato vines look promising -- nearly as high as my head and quite full. [Her] cabbages and melons are in abundance. But Henry is about to start for town and I must close [in order that I might send this along with him.] My regards to all, especially to my mother. I have not heard from her in a long time. It seems pleasant that I shall see you so soon, as well as her. -- Your James.

We lost our reconing here for about the last week through some oversight in looking at the calendar. (You know that we are like a vessel away out far upon the main, likely to have a false reconing until some other steamer floats in the breeze hard by crying, "Ahoy!") [The consequence of my misreading the calendar is that] time has been set backward a week or two -- and some people [now] have longer to live than they thought they had. To me, the summer has passed with the greatest possible brevity until the last few days, owing -- I suppose -- to the great deal I have had to do and the brief amount of time [I had] to do it in. But to be called in from work a few days, beset by a species of sickness to which I had ever been a stranger and, at the same time, away from facilities for getting the news of the day or knowing anything that is transpiring out in the stirring affairs of life's scenes, truly has made dull time hang heavily and I welcome the symptoms of improving health with joy. The chill still continues but appears lighter each time. It comes an hour earlier every alternate day and, in connection with the fever, lasts from six to eight hours. [3] I think it was brought on by exposures on my trip south. I am confined to my bed only during the time of the chill and fever. At other times, I am as able to be around as at any time -- only not quite so strong. Providence sparing my life, the time I have fixed upon to come home is about the 27th inst. I cannot tell precisely when I shall reach there but probably about the 15th of September. And the matrimonial ceremony will transpire as soon after as you may think proper. I may remain in that section of the country for some weeks. It would be my choice not to have any ado about the wedding but, if you or your people would think best, be married at the parsonage and then take a trip for three or four days until people had forgotten and finished talking about it. However, this is a mere freak of mine. The whole matter shall be conducted according to your choice in your own way.

The weather here continues quite dry. We need rain much. The soil here seems to feel the effect of draught more than [in the] East and unless we have rain soon, the corn crop must suffer assuredly. That planted in [my brother] Henry's garden has furnished him with a number of messes of boiled corn. His in the field -- some of it -- is just silking out. Henry's garden is doing quite well. It has -- and will produce -- enough cucumbers for three families and, if there is plenty of rain, they will have several bushels of tomatoes. Everything is doing as well as could be expected. [Your brother] James' corn is about ten days later than Henry's. It has grown very fast and will do very well if we only have rain. A man offered to sell him five hens and two chickens for a dollar and he was saying today that the thought he should go and get them tonight and allow them to be tenants of his [old] sod cabin so that he can have eggs and feel a little more at home. His garden is coming on pretty well and, with rain, will do quite well as it is on the sods.

Our camp meeting commences next week. Owing to many circumstances, there will probably not be a very large attendance. Many have not [yet] secured their crops and others do not like to leave their claims and cabins to be gone for [any length of] time [for fear that others might try to steal their claims]. And then the accommodations [at our camp meeting] will -- and cannot -- be good. I am glad to notice that the people of your family do not neglect the subject of education but yet continue their associations. But do they keep along with the age or make it a mere formal affair? Have they many Coburns [4] Have the day and Sabbath schools been a great deal more interesting than ever this summer? Or is there a retrograde movement? All that can be done in Kansas [in the way of education and religion] must be by private enterprize. And I am glad that the people feel that these are subjects of no small importance. Shortened as are many of the neighborhoods, already a school is in operation and sustained with much interest -- both a Sabbath and day school. And I think that before the expiration of another year, our own denomination will have a first class seminary in operation with preparation for a college. We are a new country, yet I think growing in importance every day -- becoming quite as notorious abroad as at home.

What are the prospects for living [back] East? How are the crops? How do you really feel about coming out to live in the new country -- enjoy the pleasures and undergo the hardships which it presents? If you are a real home girl and can see nothing delightful in contributing to help form the society of a newly forming country, become identified with all its interests, look out upon the wild scenery of its new territory, and burn with desire to have something to do towards shaping its future destiny, then I cannot think that you will like a home here. But if to you life is beginning to be surrounded with a reality and [you] can see that it furnishes much to do and but a short time in which to do that much, then I am sure you will feel that this country furnishes a sphere of usefulness that would fill the longest life with the greatest amount of labor. I am not certain when this [letter] may reach you but if before or by the 16th [of August], please answer. Until I see you, believe that I am, as ever, your own, -- James.

While James was ill with the ague at his brother Henry's cabin near Topeka, the "Bogus" legislature was meeting at Shawnee Mission. Here, over the vetoes of territorial Governor Andrew Reeder, they passed the infamous "Black Laws" which prohibited men with anti-slavery views from holding public office and sitting on juries. So that abolitionists would be discouraged from settling in the territory, the pro-slavery legislature established penalties for circulating abolitionist literature, assisting runaway slaves, and inciting insurrections. These penalties ranged from five years hard labor to death by hanging. When the citizens of Lawrence learned of these outrageous measures, they became infuriated and held a series of conventions to repudiate the legislature. Embarrassed by the disrespect shown to him by free-soilers and pro-slavery forces alike, Governor Reeder tendered his resignation to President Pierce on July 31.

Near the end of August, James was prepared to return to his hometown of Owego where he anticipated marriage to his beloved Augusta. While enroute on the Missouri river, he penned his final letter to her in which he offered one last opportunity for her to break the engagement. But a few days before that, James Goodrich wrote to his brother Ralph about his life in Kansas Territory.

I received yours & Steve’s [letter] a week ago today & I was glad to get it. And I thought I would write a few lines to you but I don’t know as you would get it before you leave for Geneva. I thought I would [write] today as I am going to town & I can take it over and [save spending] a half day to take it next week. It will be a small sheet but you must excuse it as I have yet not much time to write.

I am glad you are going to college and hope you will improve your time there and make somebody [of yourself]. If you are there when I go home, I shall go that way to see you and to see you get along in your studies & all. How much will it cost you for board there?

Did you mow much this summer? We have not begun to mow here yet. It will take me 2 weeks to finish my fence & then it will be time enough to cut grass here.

James Griffing started for the East Thursday morning and will be there in a little over 2 weeks. He said he will tell you all the news. I sent my watch & some seeds [home with James]. The largest one is the coffee bean & the others are Osage orange. I could not find all the rattles that I kill. The knife of my watch end [our sister] Mary can have as I don’t want it here. I didn’t know as he was going that morning & did not have much time to look up anything, but when I go [back to Owego], I will take such things along to remember the country by.

I planted a peck of potatoes in the spring & I have wrote so half a dozen times. James Griffing will praze up the country more than I can do & I have no falt to find with country. It is good enough. I had to cry when James Griffing went away because I couldn’t go with him. And I would go quick enough if I should sell out here as I do all alone & cook for myself & do my own washing & mending. Hain’t what it’s cracked up to be. You won’t know what kind of a floor I have to my cabin. It is of solid dirt & it is a dirty thing.

I have not been to meeting since I left home but once & that was when I was in St. Louis which is almost 6 months. I can’t go now for the grass is so high & wet in the morning. It takes me most half of the time to cook and eat. I have such an apetite.

Last Sunday one of the neighbors come up here from Topeka. They live in town now & I have to take my letter down there now & get them. He said that one of the young men that come up [the Missouri River] on the boat [from St. Louis] with us went up to Fort Ril[e]y & di[e]d there & his brother is very sick in Topeka & they don’t think he will live. They were nice fellows. I got quite acquainted with them on the boat. They were from Maine. I don’t know when my turn [to die] will come. They had a father with them. He came here just to get his boys a place and now he has lost them & there mother is sickly & Nancy [Orcutt] Griffing says that [the news of their deaths] will kill her. The oldest died with the Diarrhea. I am well but I don’t know how long I will keep so. I would like to see Mr. Perkins here. He could see farther than his eyes could look. Is Mr. Rice making much improvements on his place? I would like to come home with $200 & fix up the old place about right. Where is George Stroup now? I bought 3 chickens for companions in my solitude & they are quite a company. You must write soon & from the college walls too.

You will notice that after so long a time I am homeward bound and, should a kind Providence spare my life, hope to have all the blessings of home and friends in a few days. My health is much better than it has been as the chills have left me. Yet I feel somewhat weak. But from present indications, believe that the trip will do me good. Should the boat reach St. Louis on Friday [August 31, 1855], as it probably will do if it does not stick on too many sand bars, I will probably [be able to catch the railroad and] spend the Sabbath [September 2, 1855] at Woodstock [Illinois] at Cousin George [Griffing's] which will enable me to reach home next week sometime.

I had the pleasure of receiving your kind favor dated August 5th before leaving Lawrence. Was sorry to learn of your ill state of health but was glad to hear you express yourself so freely and frankly with reference to our future which relieves me from all embarrassments from doing the same. Permit me to say that, without it is your desire to be released from the engagement, my mind remains unchangeably the same... [You should] never, never think of being a burden to me. I trust I may ever esteem it a delight to do anything that may contribute to the happiness of your life's passing hours and cannot but feel but that -- so far as your health will permit -- such a feeling will be reciprocated. I can but think that the idea of leaving a kind and pleasant home to go out and commence life's sterner vicissitudes with the companion of your choice will be accompanied with feelings at once repugnant -- especially as it removes you so far from home and dear friends and subjects. But to me, no place [other than this] new country can be possibly made to seem more like home. And, should my life be spared, I see nothing to hinder my having a finer, better home there [in Kansas] in three years than I could possibly have obtained [back] East in thirty. Besides, there is (which ought to be a primary consideration) a large opening to do good.

As to be in circumstances to come home every year, this we could hardly expect at first. Yet, if prosperous, I see nothing to hinder visiting the East quite often after awhile. Besides, you cannot long live out in that delightful country [of Kansas], sniff the ever blowing breezes, become acquainted with the country and its people, without thinking it among the best places of earth.

The excitement upon the slavery question is rather unfortunate as such gross misrepresentations of affairs get circulated. That there may be an encounter [between pro-slavers and free-soilers] at the next election is probable but I think nothing very serious. The emigration will continue to pour in this fall from the free states and also [next] spring which will place the question of slavery in the territory beyond a doubt.

I left [your brother] James and [my brother] Henry and his family well about a week ago. James could hardly bear the idea of my coming East without him coming along. I don't wonder at it as he lives all alone away out on the prairie half a mile from any houses. But I must close by saying farewell till I become entirely yours beyond [all hope]. -- James

[1] Although dated in August, it is likely that James wrote this letter in late July -- perhaps July 30, 1855.

[2] Ague, or prairie fever, was firmly believed to be caused by "bad air" during most of the nineteenth century. As late as 1875, in Hostetter's United States Almanac, it was reported that "All periodic or ephemeral fevers have a common cause -- Malaria. The Miasm, or noxious effluvium, arising from marshy ground and stagnant water, is the principal source of all fevers of the regular intermittent type; and the best defense against its pestilential influence is a vigorous habit of body and a hardy constitution. It is incumbent upon all persons who reside in sections of the country infested with these diseases, to prepare their systems to combat and repel the insidious atmospheric virus which creates them... The question is -- How shall these reserves of vital and constitutional stamina be rendered operative? And the experience of more than twenty-five years indicates Hostetter's Stomach Bitters as the most potent and certain means of attaining that end. Such a radical change is effected in the condition of the body by this peerless Vegetable Alterative, that within a week or ten days after a course of it has been commenced, the system may be considered miasma-proof; and so long as its use is continued, and the ordinary hygienic precautions observed, neither the insalubrious air nor the equally unwholesome water of marshy districts will be likely to produce any injurious effect upon the health of residents or transient sojourners. The restorative operation of the Bitters, when taken as a remedy for Intermittent and Remittent Fevers, is no less marked and rapid than its effect as a preventive. Bark, and its alkaloid, quinine, given in large doses, will sometimes arrest Fever and Ague suddenly, and so also will arsenious acid. But what is the consequence? Congestion either of the liver or the mucous membrane of the stomach will be likely -- nay, almost certain -- to ensue, and the patient will be saddled with an insidious local complaint, which will not only render him a permanent invalid, but may become, and often does become, the exciting cause of another attack of Intermittent Fever. Who can be insane enough to undermine his constitution and establish a predisposition to fever that will subject him to returns of the disease during the remainder of his life, when he can effect a safe, rapid, and permanent cure with so harmless and agreeable a remedy as Hostetter's Stomach Bitters?"

[3] This excellent description of James' symptoms suggests that the mosquito transmitted species Plasmodium vivax was responsible for his illness. Of the three common strains of malaria, this parasite matures, consumes red blood cells, and periodically releases its toxin into the bloodstream of its host at the interval most closely aligned with James' "chills."

[4] Charles R. Coburn was the President of the New York State Teacher's Association and a close, personal friend of James.

[5] The steamboat New Lucy was built at St. Louis in 1852 and weighed 416 tons. She exploded and burned on November 22, 1857 in DeWitt, Missouri. Source: Wm. M. Lytle, Losses of U.S. Merchant Steam Vessels 1790-1868. Another source, Ways Packet Directory 1848-1994, says the New Lucy was a sidewheel, wooden hull packet, 225' long and 33' wide. She was powered by four boilers and reputed to be the best steamboat on the Missouri River -- "a floating palace in her time."

In his autobiography, One-Way Ticket to Kansas, Frank M. Stahl had the following to say about his ride upriver from St. Louis to Kansas City: "Our packet, the New Lucy, was a marvel of beauty, a dazzling white palace floating on the water. Her hull was 225 feet long, with 33-ffot beam. She was built in St. Louis in 1852 and had the reputation of being about the fastest boat on the Missouri. When running light on long summer days, she could go from Jefferson City to Kansas City between daybreak and dark. Progress on our trip in March [1857] was much slower. The boat was heavily laden, taxing her freight capacity of 416 tons. Two tall smokestacks, ornamented at the top, threw out clouds of smoke as she chugged steadily upstream against the current...

"On the main deck of the boat were four cylindrical boilers, having a steam pressure of 165 pounds -- high for those times. They were placed over huge wood-burning furnaces. Two smoothly running engines supplied motive power to rotate two immense paddle wheels, twenty feet or more in diameter, one on either side."