'Three Score Years and Ten': Life-Long Memories of Fort Snelling, Minnesota, and Other; Parts of the WestVan Cleve, Charlotte Ouisconsin Clark
History
'Three Score Years and Ten': Life-Long Memories of Fort Snelling, Minnesota, and Other; Parts of the West
Van Cleve, Charlotte Ouisconsin Clark
Fort Snelling (Minn.); Frontier and pioneer life -- Minnesota
Andrew made a visit to Winnipeg in search of some one who had known
his parents, and there he found an old man named Macbeth, who had
blown the bellows in his father's shop, which stood just in one corner
of what is now the city of Winnipeg. He told him how the friends there
opposed his father's leaving the settlement when he did, as he had
remained there three years, and they felt the times would be better
soon; but he had made up his mind that he could improve his condition
by seeking a more congenial home, and they could not dissuade him. He
also told him that, from the accounts of the Indians and others, it
was generally believed that the scene of his parents' murder must have
been where Grand Forks now stands. He made some inquiries as to the
possibility of recovering anything on his father's claim, but could
learn nothing encouraging. He hopes to visit Minnesota again; meantime
we correspond regularly, and he takes a deep interest in the growth
and development of the great Northwest, with which his early life was
so singularly identified. He is still in the business for which he was
trained, and, by patient industry and skilled workmanship, has reached
the summit, and receives satisfactory returns for his labor; and so,
although his life has not been without its trials, yet an overruling
Providence has dealt graciously with the little fair haired orphan boy
who hid from the savages in the hazel copse so many years ago.
We returned home from our eastern trip by the way of the great lakes,
as the route was called in those days; and although we left dear
friends and many pleasant things behind us, we were rejoiced to be
once more in the fort, in the midst of military surroundings.
Soon after our return, my father and Major Garland obtained permission
to build more commodious quarters outside the walls, and the result
was the erection of the two stone cottages nearly opposite the old
Indian Agency, a few rods from the fort. The grounds about them were
improved and beautified with flowers and shrubs, and the change was
very beneficial and agreeable to us all. Here, I remember, we had
regular instruction in the fundamental English branches from our
father, whose great anxiety was that we might suffer for want of good
schools; and so great was his zeal and thoroughness in this direction,
that in after years, when we had greater advantages, it was found that
we were fully up to the grade of children of our age who had been to
school all their lives.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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