|
|
|
||||||||
 |
||||||||||||
 |
||||||||||||
|
The Free Hunter on the Ohio River Frontier
Seems to me that there is a lack of good books written about the free men on the Ohio River frontier. And by free men, I do not mean the tribalists nor the military men who killed "in the name of freedom." There were some hunter/trappers who simply lived freely in the woods, men like James Sherlock and Adam O'Bryan, but it seems like authors never choose them to write about.
There are some excellent books about the free hunter/trappers who lived later in the Rocky Mountains and on the plains, but there is no eastern frontier equivalent to, say, Vardis Fisher's THE MOUNTAIN MAN, upon which Robert Redford's JEREMIAH JOHNSON was based. A few others spring to mind, all later and west of the Mississippi.
Lucullus Virgil McWhorter on Ohio Valley trapper Adam O'Bryan:
"When asked how he came to seek the wilderness and encounter the perils of sufferings of frontier life, he answered that he liked it and did not mind it a bit and in further explanation said that he was a poor man and had got behind hand and when that's the case, there is no staying in the settlements for those varmints, the sheriffs and constables, who were worse than Indians..."
"That after the King's Proclamation for all the settlers and surveyors to remove east of the big ridge from off the western waters, there was no white people on the west side except those who had run away from justice, and they were as free as the biggest buck a-going, and after the peace of sixty-three, it was all quiet in the backwoods..."
"He said that they lived quite happy before the Revolution, for then there was no law, no courts, and no sheriffs, and they all agreed pretty well, but after a while the people began to come and make settlements; and then there was a need for law; and then came the lawyers and next the preachers and from that time they never had any peace any more, that the lawyers persuaded them to sue when they were not paid, and the preachers converted one half, and they began to quarrel with the other half because they would not take care of their own souls, and from that time they never had any peace for body or soul, and that the sheriffs were worse than the wildcats and painters and would take the last coverlet from your wife's straw bed or turn you out in a storm, and I tell you, mister, I would rather take my chances and live among savages than live among justices and lawyers and sheriffs who, with all their civility, have no natural feeling in them..."
There were others, free white hunters like Benjamin Sutton as well as some Indians or half-breeds who chose to live away from the villages and tribal politics. And experience true freedom.
But we rarely read of them. Someone ought to do a book....
|
||||||||||||
 |
||||||||||||
|
THE DEATH OF RANDOLPH NOE
June 5, 2003 - I just spoke with Marsha Noe, Randy Noe's wife, who told me of his death of cancer earlier this week. I was just about to call him, so as to arrange a meeting at one of our usual places, the University of Louisville or at a local McDonalds, to talk over historical issues. He was an excellent man, modest, soft-spoken, well centered. He knew what was important in life.
Health, family and friends took far greater importance than his work as a probate lawyer or his passion for historical research; seems to me, he was good at everything. My deepest sympathy to his family. We will miss him.
Randy was the greatest published authority on the historical Shawnee. Besides his massive annotated bibliography, he had prepared a sequel of fictional works, and was well into writing a history of the Shawnee nation, going back into Ft. Ancient times. He made copies of everything, kept them in a file cabinet, was always glad to lend them out, always quick to return my calls, always delighted to meet with me, always generous to help with historical puzzles.
I'm reminded of Norma Luallen, who worked so hard on the Blue Jacket family genealogy and who, together with some other noted Shawnee genealogists, presented it to me to publish in the next volume of the Indian Blood series. She would occasionally call me, coaxing me to hurry and publish the book. "I'm not getting any younger, you know," she would say.
Unfortunately, she passed away before I could publish her work. I feel a tinge of regret for not working harder, faster for her. And now Randy Noe is gone, and I regret not publishing the things we had discussed and giving Randy the satisfaction of seeing our conversations in print.
I'll be updating this site soon, and I'll try turning my productive speed up a notch, and I'll soon get some more research published, including Indian Blood III. Research is fun, but writing and working with publishers is work and there is no money in this. As Randy knew, we do this for the fun of it, the compulsive quest to work out the puzzles, to solve the mysteries.
But we know what is really important in life.
____________
To see name index of the first two volumes of the Indian Blood series, click here.
|
||||||||||||
|
|
||||||||||||
| page created with Easy Designer |