Dan and my dad told many stories about the Johnsons. George Johnson was born in Holland. He came over as a "bound" boy with his master. That means his master paid his fare from Holland and that George would repay him, either in cash or in years of labor. It was a common way for someone without funds to get to the new world. Dan and my dad always referred to George as "a real Dutchman from Holland". George Johnson is said to have lived for 110 years.

He fought with the Swamp Fox (General Francis Marion) in the War for Independence. In 1782, shortly before the end of the Revolutionary War, he married. He gave his wife a wedding present of a grease lamp that is still in our family.

George probably received his land in Illinois through the Second or 1807 Land Lottery of Georgia. Since the government had no funds to pay soldiers for their service, lotteries were held to give title to land in the west. His son, Emanuel, was born in Illinois in 1811, so George left Alabama soon after the lottery.

Dan and Dad said that George raised his family near Harrisburg, Illinois. He had many sons and three daughters, all of whom lived to be over 65 years of age, except for one who died of "brain fever". George had 320 acres on wheat land in one place and 160 acres on Hogs Creek,. When the family left Harrisburg, he sold the 160 acres for $125 and , "thought he really skinned the buyer."

The first official record we find of George Johnson in Illinois is the 1820 Federal Census for Gallatin County, Saline Township Illinois. That same year, George signed a replevy bond on November 29, 1820. His sons' names and possibly his brothers' names are found on numerous official documents.

George had 24 persons living on his property who were "engaged in manufacture". The township was called Saline because of the salt wells in the area, and it is probable that he was engaged in the manufacture of salt. The 24 persons who were living on his property could have been leased slaves. It was illegal for anyone to own a slave in Illinois, however it was not illegal to lease them.

Twenty years later, in the 1840 Federal census, George Johnson and his wife were the only people listed for this household. They were still living in Saline Township. It is interesting to note that they were living next door to George Waggoner. This is important to us because Emanuel Johnson (my great grandfather) married Manerva Waggoner. Family history tell us that he was from Germany, that he married and divorced and never remarried. Whenever his name came up, Dan would say, "He was a mean old man." The families of both the Waggoners and the Johnsons were gone by this time. Manerva Waggoner and Emanuel Johnson were already married.

We know that Emanuel and Manerva lived in Saline County, Raleigh township from at least 1850 through 1865 because they are listed in census reports for those years. They had 11 children, the youngest being Emily McQueen (my grandmother).

Manerva told her grandchildren many stories about the years in Illinois. One of the stories was about when she and Emanuel were just married and they had set out to "prove up" on some land.

Building a cabin was hard work. They built a one-room cabin with a fireplace made of mud and sticks. Manerva mixed mud to use as "chinking" between the logs so the wind wouldn't blow through. Emanuel heated and bent some iron to make a long hook for the iron kettle and fixed it so it could be swung over the fire or out into the room. Their bed was a pallet stuffed with straw laid on the floor against the wall opposite the fireplace. Emanuel made a hand-hewn wooden table for their meals. Initially, upturned log sections were their chairs.

Planting crops for food and for money was as important as getting a roof over their heads. If they were to survive, they had to do both jobs at the same time. This meant that they worked outside from "can to can't", meaning they worked from the time they could see in the morning until they couldn't see that night. Then they worked inside by lantern light until they couldn't stay awake any longer.

One night Emanuel came in to the cabin at dusk. He had been getting a field ready to plant. He hung his rifle on the pegs over the door only to turn and find Manerva in tears. He finally calmed her enough so that she could tell him that she was crying because she was hungry for meat. It had been weeks since they had eaten meat. "I'm so sorry, she cried.

Emanuel turned on his heel, took his rifle off its pegs, and started out into the woods. He hadn't gone a hundred steps before Manerva heard a shot fired. Emanuel always laughed at this story because he said, "I had just cut its throat and started to gut it and looked up and there was Manerva with a bowl in her hand, ready for the liver." Manerva said, "nothing I've ever eaten has tasted so good!"

She told another story about a time when Emanuel built a pigpen a little way downhill from the cabin. He used a big oak tree to serve as one of the four corners to the pen because it would provide shade from the hot summer sun. The Lord had blessed them with about ten shoats-young pigs. It looked like they were going to be able to have meat for this coming winter and enough extras to sell for cash money.

It was about the middle of the morning and Manerva was working in the kitchen. Emanuel was plowing a field on the other side of the ridge from the house and the pigpen. Suddenly, the pigs began to squeal. Manerva ran down to the pigpen to see what had happened to them. When she arrived, the shoats all quieted down and went back to eating. She looked over the pen. She thought it might have been a snake, but remembered that pigs would kill and eat any snake that got into their pen. After waiting a while and looking all around the pen, she was satisfied that whatever it had been was now gone. She took one last look around and went back up to the cabin.

Just as she closed the door, the pigs started squealing again, just as bad as before. Puzzled, she retraced her steps, taking time to look all around inside the pen as she walked. Just as they had done before, the pigs settled down when she arrived at the pen. It didn't make any sense at all. Manerva leaned over the top rail of the pen just to be sure she hadn't missed seeing something inside the pen.

This time she slowly backed up the hill toward the house, keeping the pen in view. Everything was quiet. She stopped walking and watched. Nothing happened. She turned to walk on and one of the pigs started to squeal. Mystified, she started to walk slowly back down toward the pen. She took five steps and the pig stopped squealing. There was nothing in the pen and nothing around the pen.

Then she saw it! First she thought it was a snake hanging down from the limb over the pen, just hanging there. Then she saw it move, or twitch. It moved slowly back and forth, back and forth. When she moved to get a better view, she saw the whole thing; the "snake" was the tip of the tail for a cougar, crouched on the branch of the tree. It was watching every move she made and eyeing the pigs hungrily. She had been within five feet of the big cat when she was standing at the rail a few minutes ago! The hair stood straight up on the back of her neck. Not only had she been in great danger, she knew it would kill every one of those ten shoats!

The panther was focused upon her now, seemingly calculating its chances of killing her. He was a big cat, probably 200 pounds and she was just as helpless as the little pigs. She stooped down and picked up a big stick and waved it at him, yelling and making a noise just as Emanuel had told her to do if a big cat ever threatened her. The cat began to inch out a little farther on the big limb in her direction.

Alarmed, she began to wave the stick more violently and screamed at the top of her lungs, "Emanuel! Help! Emanuel!" as she slowly backed up toward the crest of the hill that separated her from her husband. She knew that if Emanuel hadn't heard the screaming pigs., he could not possibly hear her. Her heart sank.

She knew she mustn't turn and run; that was the worst thing she could do. To run away from a panther or a bear was an open invitation for them to chase and kill you. Then the cat crouched down on the limb, ready to jump and chase her. She prayed that the Lord would help her. "Lord, please bring Emanuel," she prayed. "Emanuel!" she screamed again.

Just then she heard the sound of running footsteps, beating the ground as they came nearer. The cat looked beyond her toward the top of the hill. As the footsteps drew near, the big cat jumped lightly from the limb to the ground and disappeared into the trees just as Emanuel ran to her side with his rifle in his hands.

She pointed to where the panther had disappeared into the woods. "I saw him," Emanuel panted. "I got here just as fast as I could." She grabbed him around the neck and hung on to him. Then she began to shake. She was shaking like a leaf.

"You heard me calling?" she asked.

"Well, yes, in a way. I was plowing almost down at the bottom of the field and something made me stop and listen. It wasn't that I heard something and then stopped and listened; something made me stop and listen and then I heard you call my name."

Manerva smiled even while she was shaking. "I asked the Lord to bring you," she said. "I guess He's got a louder yell than me." Emanuel gave her his rifle, then picked her up in his arms and carried her to the house, and sat her on the step to the new porch he was building.

Emanuel rubbed his chin. "I reckon that it was the rifle he was afraid of. He knew that if I'd gotten a few yards closer with old Bessie, he'd have been a goner."

Emanuel and Manerva probably moved from Illinois to Bakersfield, Missouri in 1871. Emanuel started selling parcels of his land in 1869. In 1870 he sold another parcel, and finally, in May of 1871 he sold the last parcel.

Manerva told one story about crossing the Mississippi River en route to Missouri. They crossed on a barge. One of the other passengers had a wagon with a catfish in it. The nose of the catfish touched the rear of the wagon and the tail of the catfish curled up under the seat of the wagon, almost touching it.

In Bakersfield, the Johnson's were strong supporters of the Baptist Church. Emanuel's was the first burial in Baptist Hill Cemetery (called Bridges Creek Baptist Church). His gravestone shows that he was born November 12, 1810 and died July 20, 1887. Manerva lived four more years. Her headstone shows, born September 24, 1816 and died June 22, 1901. Her stone shows a hand with the first finger pointing to Heavin and the words, "Gone Home" above the finger.

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Henry Van Dyke, brick molder
submitted by Sharon Bradshaw Hampton
Source: National Archives

Henry Van Dyke, brick molder born in 1840 in Jefferson Co., Ohio. His father was Joseph Van Dyke, mother unknown. He served in the 2nd and 3rd Ohio Infantry and was wounded at the battle of Reseca. On July 10, 1864, in New Albany, Indiana he married Isabelle Russell; they moved to Saline or Williamson county about 1884. Their 7 children who survived to adulthood were; Thomas Henry Van Dyke, b. March 31, 1865; Charles Bird Van Dyke, b. Jan 12, 1871; Ella May Van Dyke, b. May 1, 1874; Viola Belle Van Dyke, b. April 30, 1876; Twins, Clarence Joseph and Clara Jane Van Dyke, b. April 4, 1881; and Daisy Catherine Van Dyke, b. Jan 5, 1883. His wife, Isabelle died about 1887; his second wife was Mrs. Serena Evetts of Saline County. He died in St. Louis on Feb. 11, 1931 at the home of his daughter, Ella, and is buried in Stonefort, Illinois. He was 90 years, 11 months old.

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