Henry Eberstein, now of Wichita, Kansas, was born and raised at
Kalamazoo, Michigan. In the winter 1863-4, he enlisted in the first
Michigan Cavalry, and served in the army of the Potomac under Custer
and Sheridan until the close of the war. After the grand review at
Washington the Michigan Cavalry Brigade was shipped to Fort
Leavenworth, Kansas, and began the march to Salt Lake City. Other
parts of the brigade were sent by another route. During this
expedition they protected the "Ben Holliday" overland stage line
from the Indians, and when winter came they moved to the city. The
Mormons at that time were bitter enemies of the government, and
never missed an opportunity to insult the soldiers or the flag. One
incident more than others is worth recording.
One Sunday at
the Tabernacle, or "Bee hive" as it was often called, a sermon was
preached by Brigham Young knowing that the colonel of the brigade,
Peter Stagg, of Detroit was present in which he boldly proclaimed:
"Brave boys, are they! but a dozen of my women with broomsticks can
put the whole regiment to flight."
It seems the colonel
challenged and invited an attack from the broomstick squadron; as
the next day he mounted the regiment, strung the column out to a
mile in length, and headed it toward the city, which was something
unusual. Those who heard the 'talk' the day before 'caught on', and
passed the word along the line, and there was 'fire in the air'.
They marched and counter marched the principal streets, with colors
flying, and for once the rule of silence in the ranks was suspended.
"Danger at the front! danger at the rear! and danger on the flanks!"
was shouted. "There she comes! they've got the colonel! the coward
won't fight etc. etc." Half the men would have surrendered had the
enemy come in sight, the colonel included.
On March 10,
1866, the men were discharged and became ordinary citizens; they
were 2000 miles from home, with nothing but a daily stage coach for
transportation. There were no two cent fares or cheap lunch counters
in those days, twenty-five cents per mile, and "jump out boys and
push up the steep hills." Each new driver soon discovered, however,
that the lazy soldiers held his best push for the hill ahead. After
turning turtle a few times in the ruts, and a six horse runaway on
the plains caused by a drunken driver, they landed at Atchison,
Kansas, nine passengers very much the worse for the thirteen days
and nights on the road.
Two years later, Mr. Eberstein
returned to Nebraska, and on May 30, 1870, homesteaded in Glengary
township, Fillmore county, then unorganized. The family now
consisting of three bachelor brothers, worked and lived together for
some time. They built a log house on the claim, rolling the logs up
to the place by horse power. Having no funds for glass doors they
hung a blanket over the entrance, and one night a rattle snake came
in without knocking. A sister, Mrs. Ramsdell and a child, were
staying there, and were sleeping on a mattress on the floor and the
'varmint' located itself under head of the bed. When the bed was
gathered up in the morning 'his snakeship' gave his usual signal of
displeasure at being disturbed the sound of the sister's voice still
lingers in their ears.
Sleeping under these conditions
brought bad dreams by night, and homesickness by day even the
chickens being disturbed at night would climb afterwards to a higher
limb, the instinct is common.
They broke prairie with five
yoke of oxen hitched to a 24 inch plow, and often argued as to which
of the three could "gee, haw' them best. After three or four years
of this life, they began to see the disadvantage of not having
wife's relations in the east to send supplies, so they started a
campaign to change the situation, and in the course of time, in
spite of many reverses, their strategy brought them the desired
results.
The advent of the railroads and other monopolies in
the west, under the protection of the 'big elephant' began to
flourish. The Burlington 'swiped' half of the land along its line
for ten miles on either side and wrote a freight schedule that
caught poor 'lube' coming and going. To illustrate: An enterprising
farmer of Grafton, who thought to 'cut' the elevator trust, leaded
and shipped a car of wheat direct to Chicago, but with the returns
there came the claim for fifteen dollars more to balance expense
charges.
The price of a pound of coffee at Taylor's pioneer
store equaled the market value of three and a half bushels of corn.
If you were prejudiced against burning corn fuel you might 'swap'
150 bushels at Lou Robertson's elevator for a ton of Colorado coal,
or you could step over with plenty of collateral and warm your
family through the banks at 36%.
Calamity cronies began to
breed and increase in numbers till they became a reckoning factor in
politics a class of office seekers high and low, then as now, like
the tumble weed, drifting and shifting with the wind.
The
Henry Eberstein family spent their last winter in Nebraska mining in
the snow banks. A long horizontal tunnel was dug to the chicken
house, and a short perpendicular shaft onto the haystack. Theirs was
a feat of engineering for the times. They could almost oil the
windmill standing on a snow bank, and the apple orchard was out of
sight. Later in the summer when the 'beautiful' snow had thawed and
settled, and the limbs split from the tree trunks had settled also,
right then, they also 'settled' as to the time they would leave the
country. What was left of the trees had the appearance of mule's
tails closely clipped, pioneer experiences were heaping up so
heavily and crowding so rapidly that they tired under the load, and
dropped out of the procession. When afterwards reading of school
teachers and children freezing to death on the way from school, they
wondered if it was foresight or providence that led them out from
the wilderness.
Pioneers of Fillmore and Adjoining Counties
Source: Pioneer Stories of the Pioneers of Fillmore and adjoining Counties, by G. R. McKeith, Press of Fillmore County News, Exeter, Nebraska, 1915
