The Family of August Harder: From Wismar to Arkansas

By Henry L. Harder

August Harder is the primogenitor of the Harder family in Arkansas. He came as a child of five to the Sugarloaf valley in southern Sebastian County with his uncle and aunts. Forced by the depredations of marauders in the Civil War to move into Fort Smith, he married, had a family, and remained there the rest of his life. Around 1899 August began a family history and continued it until the last entry three months before his death in 1920. It is his history that forms the basis of this present work.

The author places August and Louise and their family into the milieu of nineteenth century western Arkansas. He provides a synopsis of Augusts ancestors and shows how his family and descendants have flourished from pioneer days to present times.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Dec 31, 2010
• ISBN: 9781452099606

Henry L. Harder

The author, a great-grandson of August and Louise Harder, has had unfettered access to Augusts handwritten family history. Through exhaustive search of the public documents, interviews with Augusts daughter and with several grandchildren, and the cooperation of many family members who provided information and images, the author has compiled a comprehensive account of the Harder family from its time in Wismar, Germany to its roots in Arkansas to its present dispersion throughout the USA.

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Foreword

August Harder is the primogenitor of the Harder family in Arkansas. He came as a child of five to the Sugarloaf valley in southern Sebastian County with his uncle and aunts. Forced by the depredations of marauders in the Civil War to move into Fort Smith, he married, had a family, and remained there the rest of his life.

Around 1899 August began a family history and continued it until the last entry three months before his death in 1920. It is his History that forms the basis of this present work. The present work is in two parts.

In Part One the text of August’s History is expanded upon to give the reader an understanding of the persons, places, and events that August talks about. This includes minimal commentary on conditions in the State of Arkansas and in the City of Fort Smith as development occurred in the nineteenth century. The aim is to enrich what August says by specifying what he felt his reader would know and thus not need clarification.

Part Two presents a few original documents, the complete text of August’s History without interruption, and genealogical outlines of his ancestors, his relations, and the family of his wife, Louise Wibbing.

The descendants of August and Louise are included (in a Family History Report format) under the particular Harder child through whom they are descended. I have, of course, been limited by the information provided to me by various family members; thus, there are obvious gaps. These gaps will include omission of some descendants as well as lack of details about some who are included. I am very grateful to those who provided me with text and/or images. In order to keep this book within limits, I have not included images of those beyond August & Louise’s grandchildren; I hope someone will prepare a pictorial history of the family in the near future.

I include an index for the Family History Report. In order to provide another way of finding family members, I also include a Register Report with its index. Both ways of describing a family are recognized methods in standard genealogical research.

Finally, my grandmother was the wife of Henry A.G. Harder and my mother the wife of his son, August M. Harder. I take authorial privilege to include their families as Appendices to the text.

Henry L. Harder

Tulsa, Oklahoma

December 2010

Table of Contents

Foreword

PART ONE

TRAVEL IN FRONTIER ARKANSAS

THE CIVIL WAR IN SEBASTIAN COUNTY

LIFE IN FORT SMITH

MY TRIP TO GERMANY 1882

GROWTH OF FORT SMITH

THE LIVESTOCK AND MEAT BUSINESS

PART TWO

TENTATIVE GROUPING OF

AUGUST HARDER’S RELATIVES IN GERMANY

AUGUST HARDER’S INTERACTION

WITH HIS AUNT JOHANNA’S FAMILY

AUGUST HARDER’S INTERACTION

WITH HIS UNCLE CARL’S FAMILY

AUGUST HARDER’S

GRANDPARENTS, UNCLES AND AUNTS

THE HARDER FAMILY OF YATES CENTER, KANSAS

THE WIBBING FAMILY

THE FAMILY OF AUGUST AND LOUISE HARDER

INDEX

APPENDIX

THE MATERNAL FAMILY OF NADEAN ANN CRAWLEY, WIFE OF AUGUST MAXWELL HARDER

PART ONE

August Harder opens his History of the Harder Family in the State of Arkansas U.S.A. with the following passage:

The Harder family is a very old one in North Germany, and members of the family have lived in the Grand Duchy of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, on the Baltic Sea, for centuries. I will content myself by beginning with Friedrich Gottlieb Harder, a master baker in the town of Wismar, in the beginning of the 19th century, who lived to about the year 1855, and with his wife Johanna, nee Goyer, raised ten children, of whom several died in infancy, some in maturer years, but of whom four, Henry, F.W.G., Augusta, and Sophie Marie Harder came to America, the last three in A.D. 1857, and settled in Sebastian County, Ark. in the beautiful Sugarloaf Valley near the line of the Choctaw Nation of Indians.

I have tentatively identified Friedrich Gottlieb’s parents as Paul Harder and Magdalena Maria Schlottman. From the records of Sankt Marien Church in Wismar, we know that Johanna’s parents were Johann Joachim Goyert (born 12 Nov 1754 in Wismar) and Maria Hamborg.

Three towns, especially, figure in the history of the Harder family in Mecklenburg: Wismar, Teterow, and Rostock. Wismar and Rostock were seaports, and both were members of the Hanseatic League.

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Rostock Harbor            Wismar Harbor

Rostock, the largest city in northern Mecklenburg, is crossed by the river Warnow, which empties into the open water of the Baltic Sea about 10 miles north of the city center. It was occupied by the French under Napoleon until 1813 (Blücher, who defeated Napoleon at Waterloo, was born in Rostock). About 33 miles west of Rostock is Wismar, which has a natural harbor located in the Bay of Wismar. Wismar was under the rule of Sweden from 1646 until 1803, when it passed to the duke of Mecklenburg. Teterow is inland, 51 miles southeast of Wismar and 30 miles south of Rostock. It is the smallest of the three towns (2,730 population in 1819).

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Teterow, Gate to Malchin,

a Town 8 miles east

Gottlieb Friedrich Harder (the records transpose the Christian names from what August gives) was born 14 March 1785 in Teterow. When he went to Wismar to engage in the baking trade is unknown, but he was married in Sankt Marien Church, Wismar on 11 March 1813 to Johanna Maria Magdalena Goyert, who was born in Wismar on 20 April 1791. They had 13 children, all baptized in Sankt Marien; thus, August is in error when he includes only ten children. August says that Gottlieb died around 1855; there is no verification of this, and the death date of Johanna is unknown.

The first child of Gottlieb and Johanna was Sophie Marie, born 19 December 1813. She would go to America and be the last of the children to die (10 July 1897). The second child, Augusta Louise, was born 28 December 1814; she also came to America and died 24 July 1864 in Fort Smith, Arkansas. Another of the four who came to America is F.W.G. (Friedrich Wilhelm Gottlieb), the eighth child (8 December 1822 to 2 April 1896) of Gottlieb and Johanna. John Henry Gustav, their fourth child, (18 April 1817 to 25 May 1865) was the first to come to America; he persuaded the other three to join him in Arkansas.

In addition to the four of Gottlieb’s and Johanna’s children who came to America, two of the other children have a place in August Harder’s life and history. Johanna Charlotte married Carl Wilhelm Eckert and they raised five children in Sweden. They maintained contact with America by letters. Carl Gustav married Minna Nevermann. One of their daughters, Edda, would come to America for a time; also, Carl is mentioned several times in the History in various capacities.

Nothing is known of Gustav Adolph; Frederica Louisa died at age 19; Four - Louise Fredericke, Emilie Caroline, Julius Herman Gottfried, and Paul Johann Julius - died as infants. Marie Pauline, August’s mother, died at age 29 when he was three years old. He did not remember her, and her name is not mentioned in his History.

The children of Gottlieb and Johanna are:

image_0.jpgimage_02.jpgimage_03.jpg

August goes on to describe the emigration of the first of the family to America. This section of his History was written in February 1899.

The first, Henry Harder, was the pioneer of our family in America having emigrated here some time in the forties, first settling in the city of New York, then going west, among the Choctaw Indians, where he was postmaster near Gaines Creek, also did a mercantile business there for some years. He then removed to Sugarloaf Valley, and took up and bought land there where he had an old black woman, old Aunt Kitty, as housekeeper. He also sold goods there for some time, then went to handling stock, farming and stock raising.

Old Aunt Kitty is later called Kitty Moore, a slave hired to Uncle Henry by her master. The only Moore in Sebastian County owning slaves in 1860 was Edward C. Moore, age 52, born in Georgia, who had come with his wife Agnes, 55, born in Tennessee, from Missouri to Arkansas in 1853 or earlier. In his household was Samuel Sharkey, 24, with his wife and infant daughter; Sharkey’s job was overseer. Moore owned 13 slaves,[1] among whom were females aged 35 and 28. It is possible that Old Aunt Kitty was this 35-year-old woman. Moore’s land was where the town of Midland is now, about six miles northeast of where the Harder land was.[2] August also says that Uncle Henry owned a Negro man, whom he treated kindly. Henry Harder is not listed in the 1860 U.S. Slave Census of Sebastian County Arkansas as a slave owner. The census includes owners of a single slave, so it was perhaps during his time in the Choctaw nation that Henry Harder had this slave. Given August’s comment about Uncle Henry not approving of slavery as an institution, it is possible that Henry manumitted this man.

If Henry did free the slave, he would not have remained in Arkansas after January 1860, for the Arkansas Legislature passed a stringent law requiring every free Negro remaining in the state after January 1860 to be sold as a slave and have his property confiscated by the county. He was permitted to choose a master, who, after paying his appraised value, could own him completely. Part of the act read as follows: ‘Any deed, any will, or other act emancipating any slave or slaves, shall so far as the emancipation is concerned be deemed Null and Void.’[3]

Toward the end of his narrative, August provides more detail on his Uncle Henry. This section of his History was written in July 1920, about three months before his death.

John Henry Gustav Harder was born in the city of Wismar, Mecklenburg, Germany on the 18th of April 1817, the son of Frederic Gottlieb Harder and his wife Johanna nee Goyer. After absorbing the primary schools of his native town and learning book keeping there, he went to the seaport city of Rostock, and served 4 years as an apprentice to J.F. Greveratt, grocer, and after learning the business decided to emigrate to America in the year 1838 or 39. After stopping in the city of New York, he heard of the new Indian Territory, the home of the 5 civilized tribes, and decided to go there. He was appointed postmaster by President Buchanan at Gain’s Creek in the old Choctaw Nation about 80 miles west of Fort Smith, Ark. He was also licensed as an Indian trader and remained in that country perhaps 10 years making many friends among the Choctaws. About the year 1850 he removed his store and other goods to Sugarloaf Valley, Ark. just across the Indian line, where he sold goods for a while, then raised cattle and farmed. He was the first to build a cotton gin in the Valley, on Sugarloaf creek, but the people at that time would not plant cotton, so the gin was not a success and rotted down. But he was progressive and generally had corn to sell when others needed it. It was told of him that when corn was scarce, that he would not sell to those who appeared in good circumstance, but would furnish to those who seemed to be in actual need of it. He also had a slave, a Negro man, whom he treated kindly. He was not in favor of slavery as an institution and when the war of the Rebellion broke out, he was against secession though his sympathies were with his southern home.[4] He dealt in cattle and Indian ponies, and often took droves of them into Missouri or Louisiana for sale there, driving them through all the way as there were no railroads then and returning by steamboat up the Arkansas River or driving back in a buggy. Mr. Joe Tucker,[5] who lately died near Cameron, Okla., was his trusted companion on these drives, and Uncle Henry often sent his money back by uncle Joe, as he considered it safer with him than in his own care. Once in Pine Bluff, Ark. his life was in danger, but he came through all right, and was not robbed. During these years he had as housekeeper an old Negro woman, a slave, named Kitty Moore, who was hired to him by her master.

A document from the Schwerin Military District dated 23 April 1838 states that The Bearer of this: John Henry Gustave Harder, born 18 April 1817 has satisfied his military duty through lottery and remains for two years until 1 May 1840 subject to Reserve recall. After such time he will be able to reside in any other German State. This document is entitled Free Lottery Certificate from the Selective Service District of Wismar, Draft List No. 17. Apparently, Henry’s draft lottery number, 64, allowed him to be excused from service. Henry Harder did not leave Germany until he possessed this document, so he could not have emigrated prior to May 1838. I have not yet found a ship’s passenger list giving his arrival in New York, so I don’t know exactly when he did leave Hamburg.

Hamburg’s trade in the early 1830s was mostly with the West Indies and Latin America. Hamburg established its first liner service between Hamburg and New York after February of 1837. It is very likely that Henry Harder came over on a sailing ship. The approximate size of the sailing ships was 124 x 20 x 15 feet (length x beam x depth of hold). He could have sailed on a bark, which is a three-masted vessel with foremast and mainmast square rigged and the third mast fore and aft rigged; or he could have sailed on a brig, a vessel of two masts (fore and main), both of which were square-rigged. The average crossing took 43 days, depending on wind conditions and the weather. Longer crossings took 63 to 70 days. The first steamship sailed from Hamburg to America on May 29, 1850. It reduced the time of the voyage to a maximum of 12 to 14 days. More steamships followed, but August says that when he, Uncle William and Aunts Sophie and Augusta came over in the fall of 1857 they came by sailing ship, which was cheaper than steamer.

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Bark        Brig

TRAVEL IN FRONTIER ARKANSAS

It is probable that Henry Harder traveled from New York to the Choctaw Nation using waterborne transportation. Steamboats began traveling the Ohio and Mississippi rivers in 1811. By 1820 they traversed the Arkansas river, at least as far as Dardanelle. The first steamboat to reach Fort Smith was the Robert Thompson in 1822. It took about two weeks to travel from Pittsburgh to Fort Smith. When, in 1817, Major William Bradford and his 64 crack riflemen arrived at what would become Fort Smith, they had come by keelboat, and it had taken them more than two months of hard work to pole their craft upriver. Keelboats continued to be used, as the steamboats frequently could not make the whole distance because of low water.

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Steamboats       Keelboat

When a steamboat could proceed no further, passengers could either use a keelboat or they could travel overland. The military road between Little Rock and Fort Smith opened in 1823; it was the first road and covered the approximate route that Arkansas Highway 22 does now. After Arkansas became a state in 1836, road construction did not change until 1871. Post roads, so-called because they were built to facilitate the delivery of mail, continued to be constructed and improved, while public highway construction began to center on connecting the roads to nowhere to the post road system. The roads to nowhere were a network of roads not built to connect anything more than local towns within a particular county. Local interests dictated where the roads were constructed, and developing improved inter-county travel was not a priority because people still relied on the deteriorating system of old military and post roads for travel between them. From Fort Smith to Fort Towson in the Territory, a road was opened in 1827. The Fort Towson Road was called The Texas Road and later Towson Avenue in Fort Smith. Stagecoaches first made their appearance in Fort Smith in 1838.

As a Territory, Arkansas was incorporated into proposed mail schedules for the United States. In 1827 the schedule called for the mail From Little Rock, by Stanley’s Mills, Christal Hill, Pecony, Cadron, and Dardanelles, to Crawford c.h. [court house] once in two weeks, 145 miles. Leave Little Rock every other Saturday at 6 am and arrive at Crawford c.h. on the next Tuesday by 10 am. Leave Crawford c.h. every other Tuesday at 2 pm and arrive at Little Rock on Friday by 6 pm.[6]

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The military road between Dardanelle and Fort Smith, west of New Blaine in 2009

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Military Road Glenwood 1840

The U.S. government, in an effort to improve federal mail service, began a new wave of road construction and reconstruction of the existing military roads. These post roads were constructed from 1836 to the late 1860s under local contract at federal expense. At no time did the level of maintenance required to keep the public highways in good condition receive any serious consideration from the state or county governments. Neither the state government nor local governments had money available for use on road maintenance because Arkansans would not pay long-term taxes for the maintenance of roads. This attitude applied not only to the local roads but to military and postal roads as well. This would be an ongoing problem until 1916, when the federal government began distributing federal funds to all states for road construction.

From this you will glean that travel overland was very difficult; travel by steamboat, however, was not without its dangers as well. Exploding boilers took lives as well as snags, groundings, and collisions. In 1872 the U.S. Corps of Engineers compiled a list of 117 boats sunk on the Arkansas River, and this list was far from complete. Following the introduction of the railroads, by about 1910 the era of the steamboat on the Arkansas River was over.

The discovery of gold in California and the rush that followed increased the demand for ground transport. Even before 1850 local stages provided tri-weekly mail service between Fort Smith and the East. The Overland Mail service began in 1858; in September the first Butterfield Overland Mail stage passed through Fort Smith on a route southwest to El Paso and on to California; the trip required 15½ days.

In 1858, the Missouri River and Western Telegraph Company installed a line from St. Louis to the military post at Fort Smith.[7] When Major Bradford came to Fort Smith in 1817 his letters required from six weeks to three months to reach Washington; by the 1850s this time had been reduced to about two weeks. With the telegraph military messages now reached Washington from Fort Smith in a few hours. In 1860 telegraph linked Fort Smith to Little Rock via Dardanelle.

The railroads came to Fort Smith later. The Little Rock and Fort Smith Railway, chartered in 1853, made its first run on July 26, 1876; the tracks were on the north side of the Arkansas River. It utilized ferries to transport people and goods into Fort Smith until it came into Fort Smith the first time on February 5, 1879. The St. Louis and San Francisco Railway (Frisco), chartered in 1882, completed a bridge at Van Buren in February 1886, and the Little Rock & Fort Smith and its successor, the St. Louis, Iron Mountain & Southern Railway, had a trackage agreement to use the Frisco bridge. The completion of the Helen Gould Bridge on May 27, 1891 allowed the Iron Mountain to cross the Arkansas River on its own tracks from Belle Point to Oklahoma. The Iron Mountain Helen Gould Bridge originally served as a railroad, wagon and pedestrian bridge from Fort Smith to Indian Territory, or Oklahoma.[8]

The reader should remember that, when August Harder mentions going into the territory to tend to cattle or to seek cattle to buy, the Arkansas River (and the Poteau River) separated Fort Smith from Van Buren and from Oklahoma until late in the 19th century. It was even more primitive when Henry Harder made his way to the Choctaw nation in the early 1840s.

August mentions that Henry Harder was licensed as an Indian trader (Original attached to History, p.4). A transcription of his authorization as a trader follows:

Be it known that Henry Harder of the Choctaw Nation, having filed his application before me for a license to trade with the Choctaw tribe of Indians at the following named place within the country occupied by the said tribe viz: Gaines Creek, and having executed and filed with me a bond in the final sum of five thousand dollars, with Charles B. Johnson and John H.T. Main as sureties, conditioned as required by law, for the faithful adherence of all the laws and regulations provided for the government of trade and intercourse with the Indian tribes, and reposing special trust and confidence in the patriotism, humanity and correct living habits of the said applicant, and being satisfied that the said Henry Harder is a citizen of the United States as required by law, he is hereby authorized to carry on the business of trading with the said tribe of Indians at the above named place for the term of one year from the date hereof.

Given under my hand and seal this 22nd day of December, One thousand eight hundred and forty-eight.

S.M. Chesterford

Choctaw Agent    {seal}

This was approved by the Bureau of Indian Affairs on March 14, 1849. Note that Henry had become a citizen. This would show an intent to stay in the United States, whereas August will later say that Aunts Sophie and Augusta, at least, had planned to return to Germany after some time in America.

Copies of Henry Harder’s appointment as postmaster at Gaines Creek, Choctaw Nation, Arkansas abound throughout the family, and one will be appended to this text. The Gaines Creek Post Office was established on January 7, 1850 with Henry Harder as the first and only postmaster. The post office was discontinued on December 26, 1850.

Gaines Creek gave its name to the locale of a county court in Gaines County of the Moshulatubbee District of the Choctaw Nation. Much of Gaines Creek today is part of Eufaula Lake. The headwaters flow north from Blue Mountain in Latimer County, Oklahoma and cross U.S. 270 between Wilburton and Hartshorne and become part of Eufaula Lake soon after in Pittsburg County. Driving along U.S. 270 one will see a sign Gaines Creek as one crosses an unprepossessing creek.

It does not appear that Gaines Creek (on some maps Gaines Creek Court House) was on the Butterfield Stage Route nor was it on a rail line. The development of Gaines Creek is not significant to the Harder family, since, apparently, Henry Harder removed from the Choctaw Nation about 75 miles due east into the Sugar Loaf Valley, west of present-day Hartford, Arkansas soon after his term as postmaster ceased.

August writes in 1899 about his Uncle Henry:

It may as well be said here that my uncle Henry Harder was a man of good education, having studied French and English in Germany, and served 4 years as an apprentice to a merchant to thoroughly learn the mercantile business. He was well liked for his uprightness and fair dealing. He also had a good knowledge of medicine, and always kept quite a collection of drugs on hand, and would give or sell medicine to his neighbors. Though he would not practice medicine himself, although he might easily have done so. When he would go with cattle or horses into Louisiana, he would often go to New Orleans and buy sugar, coffee, salt, and other groceries by wholesale, and send them up by steamer to Ft. Smith, thence by wagon home; we had no railroads then. I still have copies of a lot of notes for stock given him by parties in Louisiana which, the war preventing their collection, were never paid.

Henry bought 161.62 acres of land by Patent from the United States (he was the first owner) on May 15, 1857.[9] Currently, Arkansas State Highway 96 runs west from Hartford toward Oklahoma. About two miles west of Hartford it makes a 45º turn to the southwest and stays on that course for about 1½ mile before turning west again and crossing into Oklahoma. Highway 96 goes through Uncle Henry’s land, starting at about .9 mile prior to entering Oklahoma and ending at .4 before the State Line.

Whether Henry did not importune his siblings in Germany to join him until after he had the land, or whether he had been writing over time inviting them to come to America we don’t know. Keeping in mind the time lag for mail between Arkansas and Germany, it is likely that his first offer was well before May 15, 1857.

Another factor to remember is that Friedrich Gottlieb and Johanna were dead, and the family home was eventually occupied by Carl, his wife Minna, and their children. It might not have been comfortable for the three unmarried siblings to remain in Wismar. In the 1899 section of his History, August described the event:

In 1857 he induced Uncle William and Aunts Augusta and Sophie to emigrate and join him, and from 1857 to 1864 they lived together on their farm, ½ mile from the Choctaw line on the overland mountain trail that crosses the Poteau Mountains, from Sugarloaf Valley going south.

The cause of them bringing myself a lad of 4½ years of age with them was this. My mother (whom I do not remember) died when I was 3 years old, and as my father, Carl Gruner, was a scenic painter by profession and constantly drifting about in the cities of Germany, they thought best to bring me with them, especially as my Aunts fully expected to return to Germany in a few years. But, in 1860 the civil war broke out and our money being all invested in stock and land, they could not return, and so I grew up an American. We four persons embarked at Hamburg in the winter of 1857, and landed in New Orleans in Feb. 1858, crossing the ocean in a sailing vessel and being on the water about 6 weeks.

August’s mother, Marie Pauline Harder, married August Ernst Carl Gruner, who also came from Wismar, where he was born on 12 January 1826.[10] As August states, Carl Gruner could not practice his trade as a painter of theater backdrops and such and raise a small boy at the same time, so he had his deceased wife’s family take the boy. The fact that it was the unmarried members would seem to indicate that the married ones were busy raising their own families. That Carl and Pauline moved during their marriage is indicated by the fact that their only child, August Carl Henry Gruner (later Harder), was born in Stockholm, Sweden on 26 February 1853.

The details of Carl’s and Marie Pauline’s marriage are not known. However, August says, when describing how he brought his father to America in 1889, He came and was welcomed by both uncle and aunt, although they had not liked his treatment of my mother and myself. What is behind this tantalizing allusion is not known; Uncle and aunt are William and Sophie, of course.

In 1920 August’s account of the emigration was:

About the year 1857 he prevailed upon his brother, Wm. Harder, and his two sisters, Sophie and Augusta Harder, still living in Wismar, to come to Arkansas and make their home with him. And, as my mother had died and my father could not well take care of me, I was taken along. We embarked at Hamburg aboard a sailing vessel and landed at New Orleans, La. about Christmas 1857. After stopping there with the family of Mr. Herman Danneel, a broker of that city,[11] we took a river steamer and landed at Fort Smith early in 1858 going by wagon to Sugarloaf Valley.

This was quite a change from a city in Germany to the backwoods of Arkansas, and Uncle William and especially my two aunts were disappointed and had to forgo many of the comforts of civilization. There were only 3 other German families in the Valley at that time and they spoke no English.[12] But in time they became accustomed to the country and its ways, and they were doing very well financially.

August gives variant times of arrival at New Orleans: February 1858 and Christmas 1857. In fact, they were on the Washington, which sailed from Hamburg and arrived in New Orleans on 5 December 1857. The date of departure is not known, but it could not have been before October 14, 1857, because they bought trees in Hamburg on the 13th. The passenger manifest lists Wilhelm Harder as a miller – baker.

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New Orleans in 1852               Fort Smith in 1853

In February 1899, August talks about life in the Sugarloaf valley.

Uncle William brought quite a sum of money with him from Germany with which he bought the land from his brother, also all the live stock on the place, leaving Uncle Henry only 40 acres near the Poteau Mountain, and whatever money he may have had on hand, so that the property really belonged to William Harder although Uncle Henry continued to live with his brother and sisters, and to act as the head of the family.

William bought other land as well. By Patent from the United States on March 1, 1860 he bought 38 acres, and on August 15, 1860 he obtained 160 acres by Patent. These two purchases were of adjoining land.[13] This was about a mile and a half south of Uncle Henry’s land; and it explains August’s mentioning, when talking about the troubles during the Civil War, of two houses. West of West Hartford is Tower Road going south. Just over a mile south on Tower Road is Magness Road going west. The northern limit of William’s land is just south of Magness Road for about half a mile along Tower Road.

At the outbreak of the war we were getting along very well; our stock was increasing rapidly, the range was good, and we had quite an orchard, which was Uncle Henry’s especial care. We had brought a number of pear, cherry, and other trees and shrubs along from Hamburg, which were all planted, also a number of nice apple and peach trees.[14] The cherries and pear trees from Germany did well, and there still remains after 42 years one of the pear trees. This orchard was a source of great joy to us all, and we all took great pride in it. Uncle Henry also built the first cotton gin in Sugarloaf Valley, a horsepower gin. But the people would not raise cotton, so the gin was useless, and rotted down.

Uncle William Harder was a miller by trade having served a full apprenticeship as such near Wismar at the Klaus and Grönings Mills, after which he traveled as a journeyman, but here in Arkansas he followed stock-raising and farming, as long as he lived in Sugarloaf Valley. He was very economical and industrious and spent nothing foolishly.

The wolves, bears and other wild animals were very numerous at the time, so that our sheep and pigs suffered a good deal by them. I remember that the wolves killed 5 or 6 sheep in one night and that they caught many pigs for us. So Uncle used to put out strychnine baits for them. He would take a beef head, hang it up in a tree, then put out baits all around it, and go after them again in the morning, if any were left. Very often we would see the buzzards flying about over a certain place, and go and find a dead wolf there. The state then paid 3 dollars per scalp for them, and uncle used to save them to pay taxes with. There were also panthers and wildcats or catamounts. I once helped to kill a catamount, and Uncle William walked right up on a panther, which was watching a sow and pigs nearby and did not see him until he was near it. When uncle got a stick, the panther climbed into a low overhanging tree, but uncle who never carried a gun went home and left the panther alone. Turkey and deer were plentiful, and our neighbor, Mr. James Patterson, used to kill a deer whenever he wanted venison.[15] I have often seen both deer and turkey near our home, but I was then too young to shoot them. I caught a good many rabbits with our dogs; I used to twist them out of hollow trees with a forked stick.

My first teacher was my Aunt Augusta, who taught me to read and write the German language; also instructed me in the Catechism and Bible, and learned me some good old songs. She was herself a sweet singer and dearly loved music. I shall never forget her love and kindness to me. She was all that a mother could have been to me, and her sweet memory shall live in me as long as life itself shall last. Aunt Sophie also loved me and was kind in her way but did not have the influence with me that Aunt Augusta had. Blessed be her memory.

As long as the Rosenhahn family were in the Valley, Mrs. Rosenhahn and our Aunts used to visit,[16] but after they left and went north, only Mr. and Mrs. Shott, with their son John, remained in the Valley (of German people).[17] The Schotts used to come and shear our sheep, and I remember that Mrs. Schott used to always ride a horse like a man (astraddle), which caused us boys to laugh, but they were nice old people. Poor old man Schott was later killed in a runaway of his team, and John died in Ft. Smith as did also his dear old mother. Mrs. Specht, a daughter of hers, still lives here.[18] When the war (civil war) began, uncles did not enlist. Uncle William was rather lame (having once broken a leg), also nearsighted, and Uncle Henry rather was opposed to secession. He was a Douglas Democrat; so he took no part, but rather sympathized with the South as he lived there. Yet he favored a settlement inside the Union.

THE CIVIL WAR IN SEBASTIAN COUNTY

South Carolina, following the election of Abraham Lincoln, withdrew from the Union on December 20, 1860; by February 1861 six other states of the lower South had seceded. Their delegates adopted a constitution on February 7, and eleven days later Jefferson Davis was inaugurated provisional president of the Confederate States of America. Some local Arkansas separatist groups moved quickly to seize the United States Arsenal at Little Rock and other federal property. This, and the likelihood that Arkansas would also join the Confederacy, made the War Department order the evacuation and abandonment of Fort Smith. Companies D and E of the 1st Cavalry were the garrison at Fort Smith.

Fort Sumter fell on April 14. Learning that former United States Senator Solon Borland, in command of a force marching from Little Rock on Fort Smith, had set off on the transports Frederick Notrebe and Tahlequah, on April 23 Captain Sturgis led his federal troops into the Territory, where federal troops from Fort Smith, Fort Arbuckle, and Fort Cobb would gather at Fort Washita.

Colonel Borland, with three hundred Arkansas volunteers and eight pieces of light artillery, entered Fort Smith the next day. For several days reinforcements poured into Fort Smith; Borland’s command increased fourfold. They were as yet only Arkansas Volunteers and not Confederate troops until Arkansas seceded from the Union on May 6, 1861. Sentiment to