1settlers

Missouri Pioneer History

Source: Kerma Breedlove <kermaja@centurytel.net>

Early travelers and hunters of Spanish and French days knew the pinewoods of Texas County;
but not until 1816 did capital and enterprise come hither to develop them.
Within a few years sawmills were built; and in the spring of 1820 the Piney River was filled with rafts
of sawn or hewed lumber and floating logs. In 1819-20 Pettit erected a sawmill on the Piney,
and later McDonald and Sullens erected one.

First Settlers

When Dabney Lynch settled on Big Piney in 1826 he found Josiah H. Burkhart’s mill on Big Piney. Richard Sullen’s, who had a mill four miles above the old mill, Thomas Cork’s mill, which was located four miles above Sullen’s mill, purchased by John Ormsby. In 1828 Truesdale’s mill, seven miles north of Houston was purchased by Washington Walton.

A few members of the Sullens family were here, Reuben having a farm above the Burkhart mill.

Baldridge’s mill was six miles below Truesdale’s mill, in Township 30, Range 9, about sixteen miles North of Houston, just west of Licking. This Baldridge was the first settler there & early in the 1830’s sold his farm to Ware.

In 1832-33 Nesbitt of Big Piney erected a gin mill, six miles below Houston. He sold to Richardson in 1834 that in 1835 sold to David Lynch and John T. Fourt. This was sold to Oziah Upton and was ultimately washed away. Albert Bates built a mill in more recent years, which is now in existence.

The Shawnees and Delaware’s were here in 1826 hunting. The Paola & Plankashaw Indians had their two towns on Jack Forks, about six miles above Clear Springs Post Office. They attended simply to hunting & fishing and in their dealings with the settlers on Big Piney they were strictly honorable.

Pioneer Woods who like the other pioneers was two-thirds hunter & one-third trader & lumberman, had at one time a terrible encounter with wolves. Returning after dark to his shanty, with a trophy in the shape of a deer, he heard the call, being near home he hurried forward, the wolves however were two fleet & their proximity urged him to cast aside the carcass of the deer and fly. Still the wolves pressed after the human prey & as he was about climbing into a tree they snapped at his heels and pulled him down. Clubbing his rifle he kept them at bay while he retreated toward the rocks. After a terrific battle he gained the rocks & fought until help arrived.

The pioneer Duke selected a home on Big Creek, ten miles away from the river settlements. He was a hunter and trader, and drove a team of six elks, which he domesticated. At times he would ride into the mill settlements mounted on a great elk and clad in bearskins, but about 1848 when the tide of immigration set toward the county, he & his six elks set out for California, where he arrived. In 1845 when he drove up to David Lynch’s house to attend court, his outfit, as S.M. Williams’s states, scared the horses of the settlers and scattered them.