Writing my “The Dogtrot Christmas” novella for A Log Cabin Christmas Collection, caused me to revisit my family history, Pioneer Stock, and remember the difficulties my ancestors faced as they carved out a life in hostile territory. I’m still awed at their courage and embarrassed by my comparative cowardice.
I stand on the heroic shoulders of moral and courageous giants, and I feel way too small.
What did it take to leave behind the relatively settled communities of southeastern Virginia, to push through the Cumberland Gap not long after Daniel Boone and head to a land teaming with angry native Americans, vicious bears and panthers, enormous rivers and mountains, rapacious reptiles and insects, and the ever present danger of getting injured in a time before antibiotics?
I have no idea. It’s unthinkable to 21st century me.
The depth of their courage became apparent while reading Harriette Simpson Arnow‘s Seedtime on the Cumberland, in which she tells the story of a mother in a wilderness clearing sending her 11-year-old son out to milk the cow. The next time she saw her child, his severed head was impaled on a pole being shaken at her by a Native American howling as he rode his horse around her log cabin.
Absolutely chilling.
I ran to hug my own 11 year-old son after reading that passage; harmlessly playing ball in the Hawaiian sunshine, he pushed me off with a shake of his head.
But the horror.
I’ve never even contemplated moving to a dangerous place where people wanted to kill me.
And yet my ancestors counted the cost and made the journeys across a cold ocean in wooden vessels that didn’t even have a traditional steering wheel–ship
captains used a pole connected to the rudder– a tiller–to steer the ship. On the Mayflower, the tiller didn’t even reach to the top deck–the sailor manning the tiller responded to orders from the captain on deck, shouting through a hole. The mortality rates on those sailing ships were high.
I can’t handle a modern cruise liner without heaving over the side.
Obviously, conditions in the old world or on the exhausted farm in Virginia, must have been so poor than an uncertain future in a dangerous place was preferable. Or, perhaps their husband insisted. Who can say?
Many of my ancestors were Primitive Baptists and thus motivated by religious issues. The Reverend Thomas Hanks was one of the first evangelists in Texas, crossing the Brazos River to provide Christian influences and hope to settlers living in Catholic Mexico. He didn’t get caught, but slipped in and out of what became Texas for 15 years before moving his family into the land. They prayed and believed, then moved forward.
We moved thirteen times in twenty years following my husband’s military career. The hardest move was from Washington to Hawai’i, but only because we had to leave the cat and washing machine behind. The natives were friendly when we got there, and the 747 we flew had all the latest navigational devices.
But the example revealed to me by those who have gone before, has given me plenty to think about over the years. I’ve weighed the true danger of relatively minor events, in light of their undaunted courage. I’ve wondered where the strength came from to propel them into an uncertain future, and I’ve prayed to the same God for wisdom and strength.
I remain humble, however, in the face of their courage and can only hope I someday will live up to the sacrifices they made for their own children, grandchildren and so on, all the way down to me.
It’s the least I can do.
What about you? Where do you go to derive courage for the future? Got any ideas for the rest of us?
Funny that you posed that question, Michelle. I have been thinking a lot lately about the life our pioneer ancestors led; leaving parents and family behind in the old world while embarking on a whole new life. Often then never saw their loved ones in the old country and letters containing dated news were few and far between.
In anticipation of our move up north, (which, God willing will come sometime in 2012 0r 2013), we have been looking at living a more “self sufficient” lifestyle. That is not to say without God, but meeting the needs of our family on our own land without having to run to the store for every little thing.
What would we do if we found ourselves without powerfor an extended period of time? Can we grow enough food to sustain ourselves? Could we use the wood on our land for heat? Can we hunt and fish to fill up our freezer? Can we preserve enough to get uurselves through a hard winter? We are trying to learn some long forgotten skills.
And we remind ourselves that God holds our future.
It’s really something to think about–though you won’t be worried about vicious natives–will you? It takes moral and emotional courage, not just physical courage, to start again. But I know you guys have that in spades!
No, just some wild animals ravaging the garden. But there are bears in the area…