"We Were Left In The Woods Alone" ~ Aunt Kate

Aunt Kate

Chapter 11

The winter was very rainy but not cold. As the long walk, four miles, was too much for Jim before and after a days work, we moved to the mine in February. There was a cabin, eight by sixteen feet wide by sixteen feet long on one side, which had belonged to the former owner. Jim replaced the windows which had been stolen, also put in a rough board ceiling, and I papered the black boards with clean newspapers. We had a nice heater and wood was to be had for the cost of picking it up, so we were warm and comfortable if one didn't ask too much. Of course we didn't intend to stay there very long. It was a sort of get-rich-quick proposition and we would soon be out and away.

My brother Dan was a partner in the mine with Jim, and they went right to work to take out a crushing. It wasn't long before they had ten or fifteen tons of quartz on the dump, all of which prospected well, and they were in good spirits. Poor boys, when the returns came back they received less than forty dollars on an expected two hundred fifty or more. Of course they said what most everyone says at such times, the gold was allowed to run off the plates, or the mill man helped himself. What a year that was, and the years that followed. 

They kept on summer and fall with no better results. In the fall sometime, a mine at Railroad had been bought by some capitalists and Jim and Dan got work there. Before going to work Dan moved his family, and we, my sister Anna Finette "Nettie" Pillsbury and I, and the children, were left in the woods alone. 

(to be continued)
Love,
Grammy T.

"That Night A Premature Boy Baby Was Born." ~ Aunt Kate

Nieces of Aunt Kate, Jenna, Alex and Marki in New York

Chapter 10

In November Jim wrote that he was coming home. They had removed all the debris and found, when they reached the river bed, that it had already been worked by someone. Those huge rocks and been deposited in that place in the river by a flood, a cloudburst probably higher in the mountains. So that was that.

One afternoon I saw someone approaching the house with a little bundle on a stick over his shoulder. I didn't recognize him. As far as dress was concerned he bore no resemblance to the spic and span Jimmie Ham who left West Point in June. But it was Jim arriving just in time to summon the doctor. For two or three days I had been feeling sick, and at the time of his coming, I was suffering such pain that medical help was imperative. At twelve o'clock that night a premature boy baby, who lived but a few minutes, was born, our fifth and last child.

Now that Jim was at home with empty pockets and I was able to be up and around, what to do next was the problem uppermost in our minds. It was a period of hard times, the depression of 1893 in its second year. There was no work to be had and Jim's thoughts turned to mining for himself as a solution. There were a number of prospects in this mining district on which the required assessment work had not been done, and according to mining law, they were open on the first of January, for any person to relocate. At one minute past twelve o'clock on January 1st, 1895, Jim put a notice of location on the Crown Point Mine. This mine had been discovered and worked in the early days by a company of men from New York, and it had paid very well. They abandoned it for better prospects closer to a mill. Since then it had been "jumped" a number of times by different parties and was open to relocation when Jim took it. 

(to be continued)

Love,
Grammy T.

"It Was A Matter Of Keenest Regret" ~ Aunt Kate

Chapter 9 

Before the summer was very far advanced I became aware that another baby was on its way. This meant that more than ever a little money was necessary. Then the women from whom we were renting our house decided that she wanted to occupy it herself and gave me notice. As I was in no condition to go house hunting I concluded to return to the home belonging to us in Rail Road Flat. 

We moved in September, leaving our store bill unpaid, a matter to me of keenest regret. Many a night afterward I lay awake planning how to get enough ahead to pay that bill. It was years before I had the money, but at length I succeeded in raising the amount and sent it with a joyful heart and straightened shoulders to the merchant we owed, who received it as gladly and as thankfully. He wrote that it seemed as if the money had come from God to help pay for medical help for his sick wife. "God moves in mysterious ways." (to be Continued)

Love,
Grammy T.