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Chase County Kansas Historical Sketches
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Samuel Beverlin Family
When I was in Cottonwood Falls
not long ago, Mrs. Amanda Gardner, in talking of the "old -pioneer days," related, in substance, the following incident.
Before her
marriage, Mrs. Gardner was Amanda Beverlin, daughter of Sam Beverlin.
Early in June, 1868, the settlers of Chase County and the surrounding counties also, were electrified and terror stricken with the news that the Cheyenne Indians were on the warpath, and coming this way.
They hastened to load up what they could of their meager belongings and their families and sought places of safety.
The settlers in the southwest part of Chase County; also from east Marion County, took refuge in the old Shaft home near Clements. This house was built of stone and a good stronghold they thought. Most of the others farther east went to Cottonwood Falls.
The Sam Beverlin family, living in the valley just west of Elmdale, were among those. When they got down to the Shipman home, a log house, located where the Fred Jeffrey home now stands, they saw Joshua Shipman standing in the yard, watching them go by. Beverlin stopped and asked Josh why he didn't get his family to safety; hadn't he heard the Cheyennes were on the warpath, burning everything as they went!
Shipman said yes, but he had a sick wife and a three-day old baby in the cabin and also a little girl, Julia, three years old. When the Beverlin�s heard they both insisted on staying to help protect them.
Another family passing also stopped to strengthen the force.
This made three families instead of one to resist the Indians. When these two good neighbors did this, they knew they were
endangering the lives of their own families. Both of them had several children.
Such courage and unselfishness cannot be surpassed in true neighborliness. For they were doing all they could to help out a neighbor in dire distress and need. They stayed two nights.
With what fear and trepidation they must have faced the nights at least for most of them had to sleep in the barn loft;
For the cabin was too small and could not hold them all. On
The third morning they heard the Cheyennes had gone further
North. They had an engagement with the Kaws at Council Grove. So the Beverlins returned to their home, thankful they were not molested. And the Shipmans were very grateful for their kindness.
On Upper Diamond Creek the settlers fortified themselves in the Ebenezer Stotts stone house near where Hymer now is. At this time a company of settlers were organized for protection against the Indians. Robert Brash was elected their captain.
Most of us do not have opportunity to do great deeds of valor or sacrifice, perhaps, but we can be true neighbors, doing the little things that come our way in everyday life. The compiling of a history of our Chase County pioneers is a very fitting tribute to perpetuate their memory for coming generations. It is a duty, as well as pleasure, that all those whose relatives were pioneers should see they are kept in memory as fitting the builders of this great west.
I think there is only one of those old settlers from this part of the county still living, and this is Mrs Mollie Barr of near Diamond Springs, who came to Chase County with her father and mother, Mr. And Mrs. Karl Boenetz, in 1858.
There were several other children in the family. Mrs. Barr is in her eight-seventh year, and her memory is very clear, which is wonderful. It is a pleasure to listen to her tell of those early day adventures. In recalling the drouth of 1859-1860 she said it was so much worse for them at that time than the 1934 drouth for us of today, for they had very little to start with and raised nothing to speak of so they were destitute indeed.
The Chase County drouth sufferers received their food allotment from Atchison at that time. Three or four trips were made for provisions. This was a slow process. I believe they made the trips with ox-teams instead of horses.
I think such incidents as this and there were many in those early days, should be recalled so the present generation knows something of the sacrifice and deprivations and terrors our pioneers of those early days had to endure, and how each neighbor tried to help the other. The young people of today have so many opportunities and so many pleasures it is hard for them to realize the actual cost in every sense to those who founded this great west of ours.
By Mrs L J Frey: Chase County Leader-News, Cottonwood Falls, Kansas, May 6 1936
by Lorna Marvin
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