The Way to the West / and the Lives of Three Early Americans: Boone-Crockett-Carson

g of a vast flock of wild pigeons. These, when they fall on a forest rich with their chosen food, advance rapidly, rank after rank. As those i

waves, one passing ever on beyond the other, each wave changi

gged frontiersman than his own. Nothing would do until the pathway of the waters had brought the American settler to the Mississippi River, the great highway that, whether by whim, chanc

urrents of the streams. The adventurer into the West must, for the most part, follow the reversed pathways of the waters. Briefly, the journey of the frontiersman from Pennsylvania to the Mississippi was one of angles, the first leg running to the southwest, thence northw

t frontiersman, Davy Crockett, beloved of the American people, gives us instance of this patient progress of the west-bound, halting, advancing, but never tiring. The l

the American political world, and who was even mentioned as a possibility for the presidency of the United States; a man that lived like a savage and died like a hero-one of the uncouthest gentlemen that ever breathed-such a man as thi

ical man of their time, they were yet distinctly unlike in many qualities. A writer who knew both men states that he considered Crockett the mental superior of Boone. After weighin

id, man. One man was practically as ignorant as the other. Boone had no taste for political life, and his sole wish was to live ever a little beyond that civili

riff, ignorant of the text of the Constitution, master of the practice, but unable to explain the theory, of a caucus or a town meeting, he finds himsel

Yet, wonder of wonders, we find this man, quite past the time usually assigned as the limit for the development and fixing of a man's character, suddenly blossoming out into a second development, a s

ighted, perhaps more in jest than otherwise, to bring in the crudities of expression, the quips and quirks of that language throu

self-interest, and then all at once grew big enough to set self-interest aside and to do what seemed to him wise and right-a type of statesmanship now well-nigh defunct in America. And yet we see him, in the pang of his first decisiv

tance. Then, finding himself a member of a party of souls as adventurous as himself, souls reckless and unrestrained, ardent, eager, fearless, yet without a leader and without a definite plan, Crockett the backwoodsman, Crockett the thinker, the orator, the statesman, if you please, flings himself with the others into a needless and fatal fight, rages with them in

ckett of aught of the fame that has been accorded him by the American people. In order to reconcile or explain these contrarieties, and henc

s in the trans-Mississippi period of the Western population movement. He was born August seventeenth, 1786, in Greene County, Tennessee. His grandfather was an Irishman who came to Pennsylvania, thence moved west in order to avail hi

ral of the children, John Crockett, David's father, being one of the few that escaped. John Crockett became a Revo

ian, David Crockett ran about the rude cabin, and lived because he was fit to survive. One of his earliest recollections is that of an incident in which his uncle, Joseph Hawkins, figured. Hawkins accidentally shot one of the neighbors, the ball passing through his body. There was no surgical skill possible, and it was consider

is time Crockett's father lost his grist-mill by fire. Naturally the remedy for this was to move, and he again took up his journey, settling this time on the road betwee

o fierce encounters, yet he was of an open and generous disposition. He grew up practically without care, his father, if truth be told, being a ma

nd other points in Virginia. He worked for a few months as a farm hand in Virginia. He wandered into Baltimore, with wonder noticed the shipping there, and came near becoming a sailor, but was rescued from that fate. Buffeted by f

ngers and difficulties. Crockett admits that at this time he did not know the letters of the alphabet. His father, shiftless as ever, had been lavish with his promissory notes. He offered Davy his "freedom" if he would work six months for a neighbor to whom he had given a note for forty dollars. Dav

He learned to write his name, to spell to some extent, to perform a few simple sums in arithmetic. Twice blighted in love at eighteen years of age, he

f a single slab. The platters were of wood, the spoons of pewter and of horn. In his own abode, as he first entered it, there was no bed and not a chair, a knife or a fork. Yet, after the

heir transportation, as we are advised, consisted of one old horse and two colts. These animals were packed with the household goods. In the wild journey down the Holston the family, children and all, camped out, enduring the weather as best they might. At last they came to a halt on Mulberry Creek, in Lincoln County, in what they took to be the Pro

od-by to his family, joining those wild irregular troops who, amid countless hardships, plodded up and down the region of Alabama and Georgia, meeting the southern

th wide and merry; and so we see Davy Crockett the grown man. Never having known anything but hardship all his life, he has none the less never known anything but cheerfulness and c

the Indian killings, he shows the ardent nature, the fighting soul. Hence he respects the fighting man and pays his obedience to Gener

Crockett's faithful wife, the little Irish woman, had died, and he, ever ready to console himself, now married a widow of the neighborhood, an estimable woman, who added two children to his already growing family. This second wife appears to have been a dignified and able woman.

trictions were needed, although the country knew no law and had no courts. Crockett was elected judge, without any commission and without any formal process of law. He

idacy, his name came up for the legislature. Crockett inaugurated a canvass on lines of his own. In brief, he talked little of politics, for he knew nothing of such matters. He told a brief st

sippi River. This next home, and the last one he established, was made in the northwestern corner of Tennessee, on the Obion River, near

ed but somewhat broken region, crossed now and again by terrific windfalls locally known as "hurricanes." You may see such country in the Mississippi Delta to

ly, and yet more rejoiced to know that he had found a superb hunting ground. In his early life his game consisted chiefly of deer and turkey. Here bear, deer and turkey were very numerous, and there wer

find him fraternizing with the rude boatmen from points lower down on the Mississippi River, and making himself very comfortable. Presently he goes back after his family, bringing them on to his new home in October of that year. They and their belongings are transported by two horses, this limited cavalcade being still sufficient to carry all the worldly belongings of David Crockett, hunter, warrior, magistrate an

ring methods, we may cite his procedure in h

he government;" a statement not wholly the product of sarcasm. He met Colonel P

may have some chang

Davy, "very likely,"

t by 'judiciary,' I wish I may be shot. I neve

ld regarding him, shows well enough the rude temper of his region, if we do not go further, an

s. I cum acrost a fellow who was floatin' down-stream, settin' in the stern of his boat, fast asleep. Said I, 'Hello, stranger, if you don't take care your boat will get away from you;' and he looked up and said he, 'I don't value you.' He looked up at me slantendicular, and I looked down

er. Said I, 'Ain't I the yaller flower of the forest? I'm all brimstone but the head and ears, and that's aquafortis.' Said he, 'You're a beauty, and if I know'd yore name I'd vote for you next election.' Said I, 'I'm that same Davy Crockett. You know what I am made of. I've got the closest shootin' rifle, the best 'coon dog,

al; yet Crockett himself, in what is called his autobiography, a work which he no doubt dictated, or at least authorized, gives the follow

, ride a streak of lightning, slide down a honey locust and not get scratched. I can whip my weight in wildcats, hug a bear too close for comfort, and eat any man opposed to Jackson.'" Which last remark he fain would qualify largely later in his political career! An innate shrewdness tha

s cane-brake country he hunted the black bear just as it is hunted to-day in the similar country of the Mississippi Delta, by

of fact there was no risk whatever in the pursuit of the black bear, even when the hunter was not accompanied by his dogs, whose presence eliminated the last possible danger of the chase. In those days the rifle was a s

rockett saw nothing but the flat, smooth hides of the common black bear of the South, one of the most cowardly animals that ever lived. He killed numbers of them, and enjoyed the vociferous cha

day. In one week the total was seventeen bears, and in the next hunt he speaks of killing ten of the same animals. He states that he killed fifty-eight bears in the fall and winter of that year, and in one month of the following spring he added forty-seven bears to his score, a total of a hundred and five killed in le

ed the early Westerners. In such surroundings life was a simple matter. The chase

His early methods were again successful. Discovering in himself now certain latent powers whose existence he had not suspected, he later agreed to run for Congress, but was defeated by his late suppo

to show "an unusual strength of mind and a memory almost miraculous." Uncultured, ignorant, terribly handicapped by lack of training and opportunity, he overcame it all. He got his ammunition from the enemy. He received his sole political education from his opponent's political speech

fest themselves unmistakably. He is a politician, but an independent politician. "I would as soon be a 'coon dog as to be obliged to do what any man or set of men told me to do," he says. "I will pledge myself to support no administ

e specimen of Congressman ever produced in this broad land of ours. His first act is to pay his debts-which not all Congressmen since then have done so promptly. It is hard for the backwoods congressman at Washington, yet he has good sense, good tact, good-nature and a magnetic temperament. His mo

ry's hand. Note now a sudden sternness of fiber in the bear hunter's character that entitles him to a better name than that of time-serving politician. As a matter of conviction and principle he differs from the autocratic leader then sitting in

orance of the North and East, in 1834 he undertakes a journey to those sections. At Baltimore he sees a railroad for the first time in his life, and witnesses the tremendous feat of seventeen miles made by a railway train in the time of fifty-five minutes! At Philadelphia crowds meet him at the wharf and cheer him to the e

His sayings and doings are quoted throughout the land. If his Northern speeches are correctly reported, he has at this time suddenly become the posse

hat other rugged Westerner, Abraham Lincoln. These crude, virile, tremendous, human men, product of the

d chronicles na?ve surprise that Mr. Armstrong "did not charge him anything," for entertaining him. He states that in New England he found "more liberality than the Yankee generally gets credit for." He expresses his gratitude for the kindly reception

nd approves the doctrines of protection-rank heresy for a Southerner. Deep water for Davy now! He seems to hav

vernment, he flames out: "I had considered a treaty as the sovereign law of the land, and now I hear it considered as a m

urse, to Jackson. In all these sayings he is, it may naturally be supposed, heartily a

or the past and has no concern for the physical future. His big brain, so long fallow, so long unstirred, begins now to fill up with thoughts and ideas and comparisons and conclusions. His reason is clear and bright. He presents to the world the startling spectacle of a middle-aged man educating himself to the point of an intelligent statesmanship, and that within the

ghtly endure. He now encountered one enemy greater than any to be met with in the wilderness-that great and menacing foe, the political machine

of votes influenced by its use. Poor Davy, who went into this last campaign of Congress as blithely and as sure of success as ever in his life, learned that he had been defeated by a total of two hundred and thirty votes! Then there arose from the ho

orthwith to leave Tennessee and to start for the distant land of Texas, he says, "I have a new row to hoe, a long and rough one

sippi. Texas, a magnificent realm eight hundred and twenty-five by seven hundred and forty-five miles in extent, already had an American population of nearly forty thousand; and of all wild populations ever gathered together at any place or time of the world, this was perha

led some hundreds of Spaniards, on the strength of the general claim that the territory of Louisiana extended westward as far as the Rio Grande, and not merely to the neighb

e feet of many pilgrims. In 1821 Lafitte made his rough settlement at Galveston, and the pirates of Lafitte were no worse than the average Texas population of that time. There were no schools, no courts, no law. One writer states that he sat

r state, but they wished to organize and run it for themselves. Meeting a natural opposition from Mexico in this enterprise, in the year 1835 they banded their forces, overturned the Mex

ed men, to besiege the Texans, whose main body was located at San Antonio. No American doubted the ultimate issue. All the South knew that the wild and hardy population of this new region would beat back the weak Latin tenants of the soil. The matter was well discussed and well understood. It was not knight-errantry,

nued after Crockett leaves his Tennessee home for far-off Texas. Yet at this point its style and subject matter assume such shape as to lead one inevitably to conclude that Crockett did not write it. There are many contradictions and discrepancies, and much of the detailed story of Crockett's wanderings in the Southwest is denied by practically the only eye-wi

wider field of life. His journey was down the Mississippi and up the Arkansas River to Little Rock. There he encountered many hail-fellows-well-met, and had several experiences

o's death; the "Pirate," who dies in front of the Alamo gate; and so on. There is something strangely unreal in much of this. It does not ring true. Yet we are further told that Crockett crossed the Sabine, that he met the Comanches, that h

him inside the gates of the San Antonio barracks, one of that little party whose heroic death was to set t

Whartons, Archer of Virginia-what a list of strong names was here, these fighting men, some of whom had come for politics, some for sport, some for sheer love of danger and adventure. Of these, Bowie, Crockett, Fannin and Travis might have been declared opposed to the party of Houston and Austin. Crockett's au

backed by money raised for that purpose. General Jackson openly and notoriously favored the annexation of Texas, and perhaps even of Mexico, and went so far as to suggest a few practical though unauthorized plans of his own

rt of the Government, while others are left to do the fighting." He continues, "Houston has dealt with us in prevarications." He calls Houston the "agent" and Jackson the "manufacturer." Yet certainly

came on day after day, the bands playing the Dequelo, which meant "no quarter." For eleven days the Texans held the Alamo, in that historic fight whose details are so generally and so uncertainly known. These one hundred and eighty-three men killed of the enemy

led, broken-bodied, iron-hearted, poured their last volley into their assailants as they came in. A cannon was discharged down the room and nearly a score of the crippled and sick were blown to pieces. Outside, in

opted the "Alamo baby," but the Alamo baby did not see Crockett fall. There are different reports. Some state that there were six Americans left hemmed up against the wall, and that the Mexican general, Castrillon, called upon them to surrender. They did so, Crockett being one of the six. Confronting the Mexic

before he was cut down, but this is perhaps the result of emotional writing. No one knows how many foes had fallen to his arm. No one can tell how many Mexicans each of these raging, fighting men destroyed before he himself went down. Earlier in the siege Crockett recounts picking off five cannoneers one after the other. He tells how the Bee Hunter and Thim

ughout the day. No time for memorandums now.

ly have kept a diary, or that it could have been preserved after all the horrible details of that bloody and disastrous conflict. As to the end of Davy Crockett, there is and has been no living human being who c

ics now, no statesmanship, no little ambitions now for Davy Crockett. He was once more the child of the wilderness, stark, savage, exultant, dreadful, one more of

ography. Backwoods Davy was after all not so poor a thinker, nor so far from getting to the marrow of things. After his visit to the North, and his reconciliation to the doctrines of a p

cussing freely the questions of transportation, which were then and always have been so important in this country. He was opposed to Jackson in the first place because Jackson "vetoed the bill for the Maysville road." He was opposed to Van Buren because he "voted against the continuance of the national road throu

f the times. The West of that day is the South of to-day. Thus, a writer of 1834 states, "The West is settled by representatives from every country, but it is very largely indebted for its inhabitants to Virginia, Georgia and the two Carolinas." History and our census maps show us that

1

t on the field of Braddock's Defeat became f

1

, Colonel R. E. Bobo, who more than equalled all of Crockett's records. In one year, soon after his first arrival in Coahoma Cou