In early 1842 my first cousin (a few times removed) the Revolutionary veteran Daniel
Moore in the Globe Settlement in Caldwell County, North Carolina,
decided that he needed to see his daughter Polly in Bloomington,
Indiana, and, while he was at it, to see others in Illinois. When he got
back home he wrote to Polly and her husband: "Through the tender mercy
of God I am still in the land of the living enjoying tolerably good
health. My legs still keep sore from that terrible cold I got in going from
Georgetown, Vermillion county, Illinois, to Bloomington, Indiana. I am
old and failing fast. I got a box of Gray's Ointment. I think it helps
my legs some."
Late mid-West snowstorm in 1842? Rainstorm? Driving from Georgetown to Bloomington is still a killer. I've done it.
Late mid-West snowstorm in 1842? Rainstorm? Driving from Georgetown to Bloomington is still a killer. I've done it.
How did
Cousin Daniel get to Illinois and Indiana and back to west-central North Carolina?
Oh, he hitched up his horse and rode all the way there and back, at
the age of 78.
His grandson W. R. Lawrence wrote: "I was a baby when Daniel Moore 'Seignior' visited Bloomington, Ind., and Georgetown, Ill., in 1842. I have often heard my mother speak of the visit. He wrote the entire distance from North Carolina on horseback, when he was the age of 78 years."
I am 78 now and wonder if I could have kept up with Cousin Daniel.
Cousin Daniel writes on 12 August 1842: "I was five weeks getting home, lacking one day. I staid two weeks at Lewis Coffey's. Staid some at other places." Ancestry.com suggests that this was the [brother-in-law?] who married Biddy Moore in 1796 in NC. Born in 1772, Coffee would have been between 60 and 69 in the 1840 census, in Wayne Co. KY--which puts him more toward present Interstate 75 than 65, in extreme southern KY, but a lot of mountains between there and west-central North Carolina. I wonder what map Cousin Daniel used. When he was born, in December 1764, think what maps were in existence! North Carolina, by the way, has wonderful free historical NC maps online.
His grandson W. R. Lawrence wrote: "I was a baby when Daniel Moore 'Seignior' visited Bloomington, Ind., and Georgetown, Ill., in 1842. I have often heard my mother speak of the visit. He wrote the entire distance from North Carolina on horseback, when he was the age of 78 years."
I am 78 now and wonder if I could have kept up with Cousin Daniel.
Cousin Daniel writes on 12 August 1842: "I was five weeks getting home, lacking one day. I staid two weeks at Lewis Coffey's. Staid some at other places." Ancestry.com suggests that this was the [brother-in-law?] who married Biddy Moore in 1796 in NC. Born in 1772, Coffee would have been between 60 and 69 in the 1840 census, in Wayne Co. KY--which puts him more toward present Interstate 75 than 65, in extreme southern KY, but a lot of mountains between there and west-central North Carolina. I wonder what map Cousin Daniel used. When he was born, in December 1764, think what maps were in existence! North Carolina, by the way, has wonderful free historical NC maps online.
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