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A Home in The West, or Emigration and Its Consequences By M. Emilia Rockwell UNIVERSITY OF IOWA PRESS Copyright © 2005 the University of Iowa Press
All right reserved. ISBN: 978-0-87745-943-9 Chapter One The resolution.
The humble home of a mechanic in a pleasant village of Connecticut, is the opening scene of our story. In its cheerful kitchen, with its neat rag carpet, glowing coal fire and white curtains, sat Annie Judson awaiting the return of her husband to the evening meal. It was nearly six by the busy little clock upon the mantel, and though a blustering March storm was raging without, all within the little dwelling indicated peace and comfort. In a pretty willow cradle slept a baby boy of six months in his pure night clothes, while the mother sat busy with sewing by his side in a neat calico dress and plain collar. The supper was upon the table, if we except the closely covered dishes by the fire, and the tea-pot into which the water is poured from the steaming kettle, as a familiar step is heard upon the gravel walk.
"You are late to night, Walter," was the greeting of the young wife as she sprang to open the door into the entry and met a snowy form just within it and received a hasty kiss upon her fair brow. Assisting him to remove his overcoat and hat she took them to the door, shook the accumulated flakes from them, and quietly hung them away.
Walter had sunk into a chair near the stove, and buried his face in his hands. With no word of comment or inquiry, Annie brought from a closet his slippers and drawing a stool to his feet, playfully attempted to remove the heavy boots. Thus aroused, he drew off his boots and donned the slippers, made some remark about the weather, asked "what have you been doing to-day?" and going to the cradle, kissed the baby, waking it of course, for what man ever kissed a sleeping babe without waking it? Annie left the room for some milk and on returning found him in the same despondent posture as at first. A sadder look came over her face, as she fed the babe and returned it to the cradle. Then gently approaching him she said softly:
"Supper is ready, Walter."
"I do not wish any to-night," he replied without raising his head.
"But you will eat with me, now that I have waited so long for you. Come," she added playfully, "I will not hear one word of your troubles till after tea, and if anything is wrong I know you want me to cheer you up."
It was even so; and already had the process of "cheering up" commenced. There was no withstanding her gentle manner and pleasant voice, and he sat down at the little table, and as she poured his tea and filled his plate, ate almost as heartily as usual of the plain, but well-cooked food. Before the close of the meal, he seemed almost to have regained his usual good spirits.
"And now," said Annie as she again seated herself at his feet, "you must tell me what is the matter."
"There is little to tell, Annie," he replied, the gloom settling back upon his brow. "I have seen Benson to-day, and he refuses to pay me for that last job, as there is an informality in the contract which allows him to do so legally, though he knows that it is my just due, and even with it, I would have lost upon his work."
"How much is the amount?"
"Eighty-five dollars, which with my losses on Warren's house and shop, make one hundred and fifty lost within six months. Wages are low, and I am now in debt with no means of paying since this has failed me."
"How much do we owe at the grocery store," again asked Annie.
"About thirty dollars, and as much more in small bills for shoes, clothing, and wood. What to do I do not know. I have no work engaged before the middle of April, and then have to wait six months for my pay. A pretty state of things." He went on bitterly, "a poor man is compelled to run in debt because he must wait for his dues, and then often to be cheated out of it at the end. Now instead of having money to pay these bills and something over towards getting a home, as I expected, I can collect barely enough to pay the rent for the next quarter, and keep us in provisions for a few weeks."
Annie was silent. The case was worse than she had anticipated, and she looked in vain for any suggestion which would relieve his anxiety.
After a pause, Mr. Judson went on. "There is one thing I have thought of a great deal lately, Annie, though I hardly dared propose it so long as I saw any other hope. If we could go to the West, to one of those new States where work is plenty, wages high and land cheap, we could make a more comfortable living, and besides soon have a home of our own. It is no place for a poor mechanic here-work is scarce, competition raging so high as to keep wages at starving rates, and no one is willing to pay cash to a mechanic, though he is expected to give money for all he purchases. In those rich farming lands of the west, provisions are cheap, while the wants of the emigrants keep mechanical labor in great demand, and farmers receiving money for their produce, are prepared to pay for necessary buildings and furniture in cash. Now Annie, is not this the best thing we can do? In fact my mind is and has been settled for some time, and nothing but opposition from you will keep me here. I have tried it long enough; we have been married two years; I have worked hard, we have lived plainly and had good health, yet are now worse off than at first. We certainly can expect nothing better in the future, and why starve in this teeming, crowded eastern world, when there are homes and wealth for us in the beautiful, boundless West?
"What do you say, darling," tenderly lifting her to his lap, and seating her there, "shall we go?"
What could Annie Judson say? Walter's statements were correct; he was honest, sober, industrious and economical, yet was now, and was likely to be, in pecuniary difficulty. In his present location he could hope for little improvement in his circumstances; so he turned his eyes, as many a poor man has done before and since, longingly toward the West.
"The West,"-that land of promise brighter than Canaan to the desert wanderers! What dreams of happiness, wealth and fame cluster around the very name! It is to many the realm of enchantment; every effort there is crowned with success, every hope produces in gold fruition peace and plenty! Do these dreams remain unbroken? Do the hope-buds bursting from scarred and stunted branches in the populous olden lands, open in rich and splendid joy-flowers when transplanted to the wide expanse of waving prairie and towering bluff; of shining rivers and rich unfailing earth treasures? We shall see.
Possessing firm reliance upon the judgment and discretion of the husband, Annie would have shrunk at any time from opposition to his purposes, though she was ever a counsellor and confidant in all his plans and transactions. She now felt more than usually fearful of exerting an enormous influence. She saw that disappointment and embarrassment had already shaken his confidence and courage-that he could no longer "labor in hope," and she feared the result upon his mind and habits should such experience be repeated. So overcoming all weakness, and strong in her love for her husband, she strove to look hopefully upon the picture he drew of a prosperous future in the distant West. Then they passed to plans for the arrangement of their affairs. The money intended for rent and household expenses would pay the grocer's account, and perhaps a part of the others. The sale of their furniture would cancel the remainder of their debts and furnish funds for the journey, with a small balance for first expenses in their new home.
Thus they conversed long after retiring, and Walter Judson slept that night a happier man than he had been for weeks. He had not dared to hope that his young wife would so readily leave her parents, brothers and sisters, to whom she was tenderly attached, and the large circle of friends and relatives around them. He remembered, as sleep was closing his eyes, that she had not once spoken of this sacrifice. He did not know that, waiting until he was sleeping, she softly left his side and, resuming her dress, sat for long hours in the room they had left, while tears that had been suppressed in his presence, flowed freely down her cheeks. She thought of her kind, indulgent father, her gentle mother, her two noble young brothers, and the young sister, the pet of the household. Memory went back to her childhood; she thought of all their love and kindness, their tender solicitude for her welfare, and remembered that to them Walter was comparatively a stranger. Even in her first grief, she felt more for them than for herself.
It had been a fond hope, and often spoken of between herself and her mother, that they might ever remain near each other; and this was the first sudden intimation of disappointment.
Annie had been a woman through all that long evening, with all a woman's devotion and self-denial; now she was but a child with all a child's abandon of grief at parting with her earliest friends.
But there came a calmer feeling. She knew that her feet were in a path of duty, and her heart grew stronger. She thought of the vows so lately spoken; yet needed not the sense of duty to bring to her lips the words, "whither thou goest, I will go." The bitterness of the struggle was over. Annie Judson sank upon her knees, and fervently prayed for the occupants of the home she was leaving and for a blessing upon her own little home circle, which was now truly to be "all the world to her." Then strengthened and refreshed, she returned to her pillow, and pressing her lips to her sleeping husband's cheek, and encircling the babe with her arms, she was soon sleeping calmly beside them.
Chapter Two Preparation.-The Journey.
The arrangement for removal went on rapidly for as Walter had intimated, it was not a sudden impulse, but a fixed determination to which the consent and approval of Annie had removed the last barrier, that had found expression on that desponding evening. He had no near relatives of his own, and his wife and baby Fred, comprised his world. Though he wondered at Annie's calmness and felt grateful for her readiness to acquiesce in his judgment, it is probable he could know little of the extent of her self-denial. He was again hopeful, almost extravagantly cheerful, and she would not quench the new light in his eye, to avoid all the suffering of leaving her friends. Of the home circle she had been almost a worshipped member. The eldest child of parents in comfortable though not affluent circumstances, she had been carefully educated, and possessed from childhood an amiable, lovely disposition and strong clear judgment. When at the age of twenty, her father gave her in marriage to Walter Judson, he trusted she would be to him a blessing and aid in all the pursuits of life. And nobly did she resolve to redeem the trust reposed in her.
Walter was worthy of a loving, devoted wife. Though his sphere in life might be styled humble, he had nobly resolved to attain in heart and mind the loftiest standard, and had in leisure hours and moments gained much scientific and classical knowledge, and was a deep and earnest thinker. Left an orphan in infancy, he had been taken to the home of a wealthy maiden aunt in Massachusetts, and during childhood moved among the scenes of his father's early life. But the ancient spinster was changeable and capricious in her moods, and suspicious lest Walter should regard anything as rightfully his own upon the premises; and at length in a fit of ill-humor, she sent him away from the old homestead at the age of fourteen years, lest he might expect her to make him her heir.-Perhaps the recollection that his father had been induced, while very young, to sign away his claims upon the estate to herself and an elder brother, in consideration of a few hundreds which he very much needed, was an uncomfortable one; at least Walter found a happier home with Mr. Ethnolds, a carpenter in the village near by, and with whom he served an apprenticeship at his trade, than he had ever known in the house of his only known relative. And in the pleasant, cheering influence of a genial household circle were developed those kindly, social graces of spirit which looked out from his earnest eyes, while to the superior education and accomplishments of Mrs. Ethnolds, he owed his love of literature and his purity of taste-his lofty standard and inflexible allegiance to all that is true and beautiful in our being.
They were sleeping in the church yard now, those friends of his boyhood, and their deaths had sundered the last links that bound Walter Judson, our hopeful young emigrant, to the world outside his own family, with any great degree of tenacity. With Annie beside him, and his boy to win name and wealth for, he should be at home anywhere.
Two weeks from the night on which we first made their acquaintance found our young adventurers with all arrangements completed and the place of destination selected.
From the sale of their furniture one hundred and seventy-five dollars remained after all debts were canceled. Of this, seventy-five would suffice for traveling expenses and freight upon the few effects they had resolved to take with them, leaving one hundred for the purchase of some simple furniture, rent of rooms, and purchase of provision, until a permanent situation could be obtained. It seemed little to depend upon in a land of strangers, yet to Walter's hopeful spirit all was bright. He had no fears-no misgivings-once in the West, success would be certain. If not expressed in words, this was the spirit of his dreams.
It was Saturday night, and the following Monday would witness their departure. Annie's family had refrained from any word of discouragement, and at the hour of twilight they all sat, speaking now and then cheerfully of the future, but with a sadness weighing upon every heart as they thought of the coming separation.
"My children," said Mr. Hastings (Annie's father), as he turned toward them, "you are leaving us, yet I cannot feel that you are to be given up. I shall feel as if you were yet among us, when I remember that the same Father will watch over you everywhere, the same Providence preside over your footsteps. Trust in him, my children, and we shall always feel that you are his and he will make you ours again in his own good time."
And the hale, genial man of fifty years looked 'round upon his family with a tenderness and pride pardonable in one who had striven as he had to render them just what their youthful promise began to indicate they would be.
The heart of the mother was growing too full, and Annie seeing the tears upon her cheeks, called with forced cheerfulness to her young sister, a sweet, sunny haired, blue eyed girl of fourteen summers, to come and sing Freddy to sleep. Then they all sang together as the clear girlish voice commenced the familiar air of "Old Hundred," to the words:
Give thanks to God, he reigns above, Kind are his thoughts, his name is love. The full, deep base of the father, united with that of the eldest son Henry, while Edward added a rich tenor at the second line, and Annie a sweet, pure alto. The mother listened, and as the christian's faith triumphed over all earthly sorrows, her heart grew calmer, and she thought how sweet it would be to hear those voices joined in singing the eternal praises of their Redeemer in Heaven.
The Sabbath found them for the last time in the family pew at church. For the last time they listened to the voice of the pastor who had married Annie's parents, baptized herself, and lately given her in marriage to one who had one won her pure young heart. Walter's face was thoughtful and solemn-he had just begun to realize the strength of the ties they were breaking. But no faltering appeared in Annie's calm demeanor, no cloud came over the clear light of her eyes. She had prayed for strength to enable her to meet the duties of this day, and it was given.
The day came to an end-the Sabbath School class was given up to her successor-the last visit and blessing of her aged pastor and his wife, were received, and at family prayer her father had read with his voice trembling with suppressed feeling, "Let not your heart be troubled, ye believe in God, believe also in me," and had committed his dear ones to the care of Him who "doeth all things well." They retired early, for sunrise must see them upon their journey.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from A Home in The West, or Emigration and Its Consequences by M. Emilia Rockwell Copyright © 2005 by the University of Iowa Press. Excerpted by permission.
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