Daniel Boone by John Stevens Cabot Abbott: Chapter 14

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Chapter fourteen of Daniel Boone by John S. C Abbot.
This LibriVox recording is in the public domain, recorded by
Alison Hester. Chapter fourteen conclusion Colonel Boone, having lost all
his property, sent in a memorial by the advice of
his friends to the Legislature of Kentucky and also another

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to Congress. Kentucky was now a wealthy and populous state
and was not at all indisposed to recognize the invaluable
services she had received from Colonel Boone. An allusion to
these services, Governor Moorehead said, it is not assuming too
much to declare that without Colonel Boone, in all probability,

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the settlements could not have been upheld, and the conquest
of Kentucky might have been reserved for the emigrants of
the nineteenth century. What obstacles stood in the way of
a liberal grant of land by the Kentucky Legislature, we
do not know. We simply know that, by a unanimous
vote of that body, the following preamble and resolution were
passed the Legislature of Kentucky, taking into view the many

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eminent services rendered by Colonel Boone in exploring and settling
the western country from which great advantages have resulted not
only to this state, but to this country in general,
and that from circumstances over which he had no control,
he is now reduced to poverty, not having so far
as appears, an acre of land out of the vast

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territory he has been a great instrument in peopling. Believing
also that it is as unjust as it is in
politic that useful enterprise and eminent services should go unrewarded
by a government where merit confers the only distinction, and
having sufficient reason to believe that a grant of ten

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thousand acres of land which he claims in Upper Louisiana,
would have been confirmed by the Spanish Government, had not
said territory passed by Session into the hands of the
General Government. Therefore resolved by the General Assembly of the
Commonwealth of Kentucky, that our Senators in Congress be requested
to make use of their exertions to procure a grant

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of land in said territory to said Boone, either the
ten thousand acres to which he appears to have an
equitable claim from the grounds set forth to this Legislature
by way of confirmation, or to such quantity in such
place as shall be deemed most advisable by way of donation.
While this question was pending before Congress, Colonel Boone met

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with the heaviest grief he had thus far encountered on
his stormy pilgrimage. In the month of March eighteen thirteen,
his wife, whom he tenderly loved, died at the age
of seventy six. She had been one of the best
wives and mothers, seeking in all things to conform to
the wishes of her husband and aid him in his plans.

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She was a devoted wife and loving mother. Colonel Boone
selected upon the summit of a ridge the place for
her burial, and marked out the spot for his own
grave by her side. We have no means of knowing
what were the religious views which sustained Missus Boone in
her dying hour. Her life was passed in the discharge
of the humble duties of a home in the wilderness,

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and she had no biographer. But we do know that
the religion of Jesus had penetrated many of these remote cabins,
and had ennobled the lives of many of these hearty pioneers.
Under the Spanish government, the Roman Catholic religion was the
established religion of the province, and none other was openly tolerated. Still,

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the authorities were so anxious to encourage immigration from the
United States that they avoided any rigorous enforcement of the law.
Each emigrant was required to be a good Catholic un
bon cathlique, but by covenants of the authorities, only a
few general questions were asked, much as do you believe

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in Almighty God, in the Holy Trinity, in the True
Apostolic Church, in Jesus Christ our Savior, in the Holy Evangelists.
The ceremony was closed by the declaration that the applicant
was unbon catholique. Thus, many Protestant families entered the Spanish
territory and remained undisturbed in their religious principles. Protestant clergymen

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crossed over the Mississippi River and unmolested, preached the Gospel
in the log cabins of the settlers. The Catholic priests
received their salaries from the Spanish crown, and no taxes
for religion were imposed. The Reverend John Clark, a very
zealous Christian minister, made monthly excursions to the Spanish territory

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the commandant at Saint Louis, mister Trudeau would take no
notice of his presence till the time when he knew
that mister Clark was about to leave. Then he would
send a threatening message ordering him to leave within three days.
One of the emigrants, mister Murich of the Baptist persuasion,
who knew the commandant very well, petitioned for permission to

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hold religious meetings at his house and to have mister
Clark preach. Mister Trudeau replied, you must not put a
bill upon your house or call it a church, but
if any of your friends choose to meet at your house, sing,
pray and talk about religion, you will not be molested,
provided you continue as I suppose you are whom bon catholique. Thus,

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in reality, there was scarcely any restraint in those remote regions,
even under the Spanish regime imposed upon religious freedom. Christian songs,
the Penitential and the Triumphant often ascended blended with prayers
and praises from these lonely and lowly homes in the wilderness.
Thus characters were formed for heaven and life was ennobled

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and often far more of true nobility, soul and more
real and satisfying enjoyment were found in those log huts,
illumined only by the blaze of the pitch pine knot
than Lewis the fourteenth and his courtiers ever experienced amidst
the splendors and the luxuries of Broseilles and of Marley.

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We do not know that Colonel Boone ever made a
public profession of his faith in Christ, though somewhere we
have seen it stated that he died an honored member
of the Methodist Church. It is certain that the religious
element predominated his nature. He was a thoughtful, serious, devout
good man. He walked faithfully in accordance with the light

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and the privileges which were conferred upon him in his
singularly adventurous life. Colonel Boone was seventy nine years of
age when Congress conferred upon him a grant of eight
hundred and fifty acres of land. He had never repined
at his lot, had never wasted his breath in unavailing murmurs.
He contentedly took life as it came, and was ever

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serene and cheerful. But this grant of land, though it
came so late, greatly cheered him. He was no longer
dependent on others. He had property rapidly increasing in value
to leave to the children and the grandchildren he so
tenderly loved. His aged limbs would no longer allow him
to expose himself to the vicissitudes of hunting, and he

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took up his abode with one of his sons, enjoying
perhaps as serene and happy in old age as ever
fell to the lot of mortals. His conversation often gathered
charmed listeners around him, for he had a very retentive memory,
and his mind was crowded with the incidents of his
romantic career. It is said that at this period of

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his life an irritable expression never escaped his lips. His
grandchildren vied with each other in affectionate attentions to one
whom they ardently loved, and of whose celebrity they were
justly proud. Colonel Galloway, the gentlemen whose two daughters were
captured with one of the daughters of Colonel Boone in

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a boat by the Indians, which event our readers will
recall to mind, visited Colonel Boone in Missouri about this time.
He gives a very pleasing description of the gentle and
genial old man as he then found him. His personal
appearance was venerable and attractive, very neatly clad in garments
spun woven and made in the cabin. His own room

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consisted of a cabin by itself, and was in perfect order.
His countenance was pleasant, calm and fair, his forehead high
and bold, and the soft silver of his hair. In
unison with his length of days, he spoke feelingly with
solemnity of being a creature of Providence, ordained by Heaven
as a pioneer in the wilderness to advance the civilization

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and the extension of his country. He professed the belief
that the Almighty had assigned him a work to perform,
and that he had only followed the pathway of duty
in the work which he had pursued. That he had
discharged his duty to God and his country by following
the direction of Providence. His stormy day of life had
passed away into an evening of unusual beauty and serenity. Still,

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he was continually busy, engaged in innumerable acts of kindness
for his neighbors and his friends. He could repair rifles,
make in carved powder horns of great beauty, and could
fashion moccasins and snow shoes of the most approved patterns.
His love for the solitude of the wilderness and for
the excitement of the hunter's life continued unabated to the last.

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He loved to cut tender slices of venison and to toast
them upon the end of his ramrod, over the glaring
coals of his cabin fire, finding in that repast a
treat more delicious than any gormand ever yet experienced in
the viands of the most costly restaurants of the Palais
Royale or the Boulevard. Upon one occasion, he could not

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resist the impulse of again going hunting, though in the
eighty second year of his age, exacting from his friends
the promise that he should die, his remains should be
brought back and buried by the sight of thoes of
his wife, he took a boy with him and went
to the mouth of the Kansas River, where he remained
two weeks. Returning from this his last expedition, he visited

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his youngest son, Major Nathan Boone, who had reared a
comfortable stone house in that remote region to which immigrants
were now rapidly moving. Here he died after an illness
of but three days, on the twenty sixth day of
September eighteen twenty. He was then eighty six years of age.

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Soon after the death of his wife, Colonel Boone made
his own coffin, which he kept under his bed, awaiting
the day of his burial. In this coffin, he was
buried by the side of his wife. Missouri, though very
different from the Missouri of the present day, was no
longer an unpeopled wilderness. The Indians had retired, thousands of

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emigrants had flocked to its fertile plains, and many thriving
settlements had sprung up along the banks of its magnificent streams.
The great respect with which Colonel Boone was regarded by
his fellow citizens was manifest in the large numbers who
were assembled at his burial. The Legislature of Missouri, which
chanced then to be in session, adjourned for one day

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in respect for his memory, and passed a resolve that
all the members should wear a badge of mourning for
twenty days. This was the first legislature of the new state.
Colonel Boone was the father of nine children, five sons
and four daughters. His two eldest sons were killed by
the Indians. His third son, Daniel Morgan Boone, had preceded

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his father in his emigration to the Upper Louisiana, as
it was then called, and had taken up his residence
in the fem Osage Settle. He became a man of
influence and comparative wealth, and attained the advanced age of
four score. Jesse, the fourth son, also emigrated to Upper
Louisiana about the year eighteen o six, where he died

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a few years after. The youngest son, Nathan, whose privilege
it was to close his father's eyes and death, had
found a home beyond the Mississippi. He became a man
of considerable note and received the commission of captain in
the United States Dragoons. The daughters, three of whom married,
lived and died in Kentucky. In the meantime, Kentucky, which

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Boone had found a pathless wilderness, the hunting ground of Indians,
who were scarcely less wild and savage than the beasts
they pursued in the chase, was rapidly becoming one of
the most populous, wealthy, and prosperous states in the Union.
Upon the Eastern bank of the Kentucky River. The beautiful
city of Frankfort had risen, surrounded by remarkably romantic and

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splendid scenery. It had become the capital of the state,
and was situated about sixty miles from the entrance of
the Kentucky into the Ohio River. Many of the houses
were tastefully built of brick or of marble, and the
place was noted for its polished, intelligent and hospitable society.
It was but a few miles above Frankfort, upon this

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same river that Colonel Boone had reared the log fort
of Boonsborough, when scarcely a white man could be found
west of the Alleghenies. In the year eighteen forty five,
the citizens of Frankfort, having in accordance with the refinements
of modern tastes, prepared a beautiful rural cemetery in the
suburbs of their town. Resolved to consecrate it by the

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interment of the remains of Daniel Boone and his wife.
The legislature, appreciating the immense obligations of the state to
the illustrious pioneer, cooperated with the citizens of Frankfort in
this movement. For twenty five years the remains of Colonel
Boone and his wife had been moldering in the grave
beyond the banks of the Missouri. There seemed, said one

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of the writers of that day, to be a peculiar
propriety in this testimonial of the veneration borne by the
Commonwealth for the memory of its illustrious dead. And it
was bidding that the soil of Kentucky should afford the
final resting place for his remains, whose blood in life
had been so often shed to protect it from the

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fury of savage hostility. It was the beautiful and touching
manifestation of filial affection shown by children to the memory
of a beloved parent. And it was right that the
generation which was reaping the fruits of his toils and dangers,
should desire to have in their midst and decorate with
the tokens of their love, the sepulcher of this primeval patriarch,

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whose stout heart watched by the cradle of this now
powerful Commonwealth. The honored remains of Daniel Boone and his
wife were brought from Missouri to Frankfort, and the reinterment
took place on the thirteenth of September eighteen forty five.
The funeral ceremonies were very imposing. Colonel Richard M. Johnson,

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who had been Vice President of the United States, and
others of the most distinguished citizens of Kentucky officiated as pallbearers.
The two coffins were garlanded with flowers, and an immense
procession followed them to their final resting place. The Honorable
John J. Crittenden, who was regarded as the most eloquent

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man in the state, pronounced the funeral oration, and there,
beneath an appropriate monument, the body of Daniel Boone now
lies awaiting the summons of the resurrection. Trumpet life's labor
done securely laid in this his last retreat, unheeded. O'er
his silent dust, the storms of earth shall beat the

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end end of Chapter fourteen and end of Daniel Boone
by John S. C Abbott, recorded by Alison Hester In Athens, Georgia,