The Indianapolis Star from Indianapolis, Indiana • Page 51

Magazine Section TlIE SUNDAY ST A Pi. Magazine Section SUNDAY MORXIXG, OCTOBER Indiana Was Known As APesopt For Ma fWild Animals A INDS ENTURy NY 0 Ago. Hears, Wildcats, Wolves, Deer, Buffalo, Mountain Lions and Coyotes Used to Roam Hoosier State in Early Days. BY R. S.

BLATCHLEY. IECENTLY in western Pennsylvania I surprised two WE does breakfasting on lush grass in a deep glen beside an inland roadway. Only for a second did they hold their startled positions with heads half raised from the ground and ears pointed alert, then with supreme grace they made great-leaps into nearby timber. Their new coats of cinnamon hue, later to become gray with the coming of fall and winter, were in fine contrast with the deep, fresh greens of the glen. Such a sight brought to me great joy, for wild i A mm i some kind of cotton goods and squeejing tallow around the wick until the desired size Is obtained.

Light Blown Out. "Then they started for the cave and lit one of the sluts when they started In. After going In some distance they came to where the cave divided, one passage going to the left and the other to the right. There they lighted the other slut and placed it on the dividing point so that it they should get lost and get back there they would know where they were. They then took one of the passages and after traveling some distance they came to quite a room with high celling and the floor about six feet lower than the passage.

They went in on shelving rocks projecting over the floor around the outside edges of the room. These rocks allowed a man to squeeze around on about a level with the entrance without going down on the floor. They finally spied a boar at the opposite side of the room lying under these shelving rocks. My father took the slut and crawled around on these shelving rocks until he got over the bear so as to give James Wood a good chance to draw a bead on the bear. As Wood was considered the best hunter he did the shooting.

"At the crack of the gun the concussion knocked the light out, and there they were with a wounded bear in darkness they could almost feel. They had to grope their way back to where they had left their other slut burning. Father was the hindmost one getting back. He afterwards said hp felt like the bear was just behind hint all the way. Falls Down in Hole.

"After consulting for awhile, they concluded best not to go back into the cave where there was a wounded bear, so they took the other branch of the cava and after traveling some distance they came to another room similar to the first one, only larger. They got down on the floor of this and after getting pretty well across It they discovered another bear. He sneaked around as though he wanted to avoid trouble, but that did not meet the hunters' views, so Wood fired on him and wounded him just enough to enrage him. He came tear.ing at them and they all broke for the outlet. Henry Wood stepped Into a hole and fell down.

The bear ran over him and as he did so gathered up Wood's gun and slashed it around as if he would break it to pieces. Henry Wood cried out, for God's sake not to leave him. With that, father stopped and stayed with him. He said he would not havo left him If the bear had eaten them both up. "James Wood and Smith both got up out of the declivity and as the bear made a rush to get out Weed gave him another shot that turned 'him, and as be came back father tired on him and that turned him.

Thus they kept, him going and coining back and forth, Smith loading for Wood and Henry Wood loading for father, until the bear's head was in a jelly; hut he had gotten too mad to die. Finally Hairy Wood got a chance to get out and left father alone, and he got back and laid down and crept under the ledge of rock as far as he could, pretending to be dead as much as possible, as he had always heard that a bear would not disturb a dead man. liolli Heasts Killed. "The bear came and put his nose to the back of father's neck and opened his mouth and let about a quart of blood run down his back. He said that he thought that his turn had come, but the bear laid down against him without further molestation, only breathing his fetid breath where father had to breathe it.

Hostilities had to cease until the bear saw fit to get up, which he did after due time. They then soon dispatched him. They skinned and quartered hirn, each one taking a quarter, and they left the cave forever. They built a fire and watched till day for the other bear to come out, but when day came they found -by the tracks in the snow that he had already left. They then went to a neighbor who kept a pack of dogs, obtained them and put them on the trail of the wounded bear.

They tracked him but a few miles, where they found him dead, so they got both of the beasts." From the foregoing tales and related facts Indiana was known as a resort for many kinds of wild life during the first half of the nineteenth century. Travel in the wilderness was a matter of caution and men had to go armed to protect themselves in an n-counter with certain of the larger animals. The wild life was sought for food at a time when food was scarce, in the early days when domesticated stock was valuable and necessary to living it was essential to provide constant protection for them from depredations of these roaming beasts. Hogs especially were choice bits for bruin. Today the forests and wamps are gone and the natural habitat for the wild life has passed forever in Indiana.

Only the mountain areas are now provided with preserves for scattered wild life. travel in lie old days. deer in any locality in this country are now counted as uncommon. Within two miles of the very spot where these does were contentedly feeding there is a broad dam erected with superb masonry across an original small stream. This dam holds impounded several acres of deep waters.

The only visible- bulwarks of the dam are the branches and ends of limbs and tree trunks, but back of the con- 1J 1 J. 1 strucuon is aennne evidence of the presence of many beaver. Around the dam are countless stumps of saplings and even trees, mute evidence of efficient activities that have gone on to obtain a safe haven for their peculiar style of habitat. I waited long and in vain to see one of these tiny lumbermen, but had to be content with only their handiwork. Answers Full of Facts.

These are two instances of the meager survival today of wild game in the United States, more particularly in what we are pleased to call our settled sections. There are greater numbers and varieties of wild game in some of the isolated regions of the Rocky mountains and the high Sierras, but for the most part they are too far removed from the itinerary of the average traveler. More and more are laws becoming stringent in the protection of any and all game in order that the hunting lust of man may be curtailed. Deer are now sought in certain mountain sections at prescribed times so that they may be kept in a state of virility. Hardly ever do you hear of bear, cougar, mountain lion, wildcat, wolves or coyotes outside the isolated sections where men travel only under hardship.

What was the situation in Indiana a century ago? At the beginning of the present century my father, W. S. Blatch-ley, who was then state geologist of Indiana, sent out a published inquiry directed to the then oldest residents of the state, in which he asked for data relative to the presence of wild game in the earliest days of our statehood. The answers that came were full of interesting facts accompanied by not a few stories dealing with the more fierce and larger animals. The more important of these are presented.

Indians Used Arrow, Tomahawk. Prior to the separation of Indiana from the Illinois territory and its recognition as a sovereign state in 1816, the country was very sparsely settled. The great prairie stretches of the northern and northwestern sections of the state were veritable swamps. The hillier central and southern portions were a timbered wilderness with widely scattered cleared places where the earliest tettlers had themselves home sites. The Indian, who for centuries had made this territory an expansive hunting domain, had moved on Westward before the persistent encroachment of the white man.

In these prewhlte man's days there Is no qucs ion of a great natural game realm existing here, wherein the buffalo, beaver, elk, deer, bear, wolf, otter and predatory cougar ran free and the Indian matched his wit and skill with bow and arrow and hand-thrown tomahawk or ax in search of food or in protection. It is well known that the numerous streams of the state teemed with abundant fish of all kinds. Wild fowl flew in abandon everywhere. There are evidences still of ancient "kitchen middens" or refuse piles from Indian villages where the accumulated and the cubs were then killed. This incident took place in the early forties.

"Some time before this the attention of my father and uncle, who lived near the Lizton town site, was attracted by the squealing of a hog in the wood.i. Just before their arrival on the scene they heard the crack of a rifle shot, after which they encountered a hunter by the name of John Gooding who had just shot and a large bear holding the squealing hog. The bear escaped to a nearby thicket, where its carcass was afterward found. Deer Plentiful Until 1855. "Up to the fall of 1855 deer were plentiful in this part of the state.

They were hunted chiefly by dogs until they finally became so scarce that but scattering ones were noted by the residents. I remember in the fall of 1857 I saw some dogs flush a fawn from the wild grass and run it from the brush into a cornfield, where it was cornered against a rail fence and killed. Early in the fall of 1871 a large buck was sighted on my farm west of Llzton. Some boys and an old coon dog scared it away, but it was killed the next day near Danville. We thought that it had escaped from some game park, for no deer had been seen in this section of the state for a good many years.

"In the fall of 1853 the 8 and 10-year-old sons of S. S. Sherard, who lived about two miles east of Llzton, were attracted by the barking of their dog in a woods near the Indianapolis and Craw-fordsville road. They found their dog worrying a large buck deer. When the boys were sighted they were charged by the buck and the younger child climbed a small sapling, where he stayed until he found an opportunity to escape and run home in alarm.

The older boy sought refuge behind a large tree and, as he carried an ax, -he bravely stepped out from behind the tree as the deer charged him and struck the deer on the head, which felled the animal and thus permitted the boy to strike another death blow. The arrival of the boy's mother found the lad calmly sitting on the deer's body. Killed Wild I'igeons In 72. "Wild turkey were common to the prairie strip until after the civil war. The last one I recall being killed was about January, 1875.

I had the pleasure of a wing shot at this last flock of this fine wild fowl. "When I was a boy roaming the woods with other boys we used to frequently pick up deer antlers and occasionally we found the partly decayed horns of the elk. "We killed many wild pigeons in the spring of 1872 and prior to and a few in the years immediately thereafter. In the spring of 1888 a small covy of them lingered around my farm and they were the last that I ever saw in this part ot the country. However, my brother Henry sa' a lone one light in an evergreen tree in his yard In March, 1 894.

This is the last one I ever heard of here." From Oxford, Mrs. Annie shells of fresh water mussels, bones of dead animals and the trash of primitive housekeeping were dumped. Even after the forced migration of the red man there still persisted most of the types of game that had fed him throughout the centuries. The coming of the white man alone was the signal for the extinction of this game. In Search of (Jmne.

The long hard days of the early pioneer were filled with a desperate urge for existence. Some of them spent almost their entire time in search of game. They were known among their neigh-bora as hunters or persons versed in the ways of woodcraft. This trait more often comprised the borrowed lessons of the Indian, well seasoned with the natural intelligence of their own ilk. It was the pioneer himself that was con fronted with the more dangerous encounters with wild animals.

He sought to protect his family and himself from their depredations upon his small flock of live stock, whose protection was necessary for his existence. Herein arose the cause for the several stories related bearing authoritative evidence of the wild life as existed in the state a century ago. Let these early pioneers tell their own story. In January, 1909, George L. Leak of Lizton, wrote as follows: "In the north part of Hendricks county, just west of the meridian line, is a strip of country extending from three miles in Hendricks county to several miles in Boone county, known as the Seven-Mile prairie.

Until after the civil war this region was wet and uncultivated, but it was covered here and there with brush and wild prairie grass. Here was the seat of a great game resort where, especially in the fall of the year, gray wolves, lynx (wild cat), gray fox, deer, wild turkey and an occasional black bear were found. Many old remnants of beaver dams still in evidence, indicating that beaver must have been very plentiful in earlier days. Ii.it ties Hear ami Cubs. "A pioneer by the name of David Osborn, who lived about three miles northeast of the town site of Llzton, went into the woods one morning near the prairie strip in search of some of his lost hogs.

He had proceeded but a short distance from his home when he encountered an old she-bear with two cubs. He shot and wounded the mother bear, while the two cubs took to small trees. Having but one rifle ball with him, he called back to his wife, who was watching the encounter, and asked her to bring him additional ammunition while he sought to keep the bears at bay. Te old bear tried to escape, but the resourcefulness of this man was shown in his cutting wooden plugs for his gun, which he loaded and shot at the cubs. The harmless Impact of the wooden plugs caused them to set up a tcriillc squall that brought back the mother bear in protection of her young.

She was shot and killed later with another rifle ball. Dogs were brought up (2) Deer. particular day In question, while gathering the sap, they noticed the mare they were driving became vrry rfHtless and excited. A large black bear emerged from the timber and came rapidly toward them. Doth girls climbed quickly on (he old mare and rode astride her for assurance of escape.

They pne the horse her rein and she started on a run for the susar camp, where their fathpr was boiling the sap into sirup. The mumps and rough ground tore the sled and barrel to pieces. The father gathered a group ot neighbors and the large bear was tracked down and shot the following day. "At another time in 1S31 my mo', her was traveling west, of what Is now known as Paragon. She had to cross a bayou over a foot log, and while on the middle of it she looked up to see a large black bear walking briskly toward her.

He slopped at a log lower than the one on which she stood and reared himr.elf upon his hind feet and stood looking at her. They were but a few feet apart. She was so badly frightened as a matter of course, for she new-there was no one within hearing of a scream; also her destination, her mother's home, lay beyond a heavy timbered section. Claps Hands and Hollers." "Her presence of mind did not forsake her, for she remembered hearing a family doctor saying, 'In case one met a bar he should clap his hands and give a shrill holler and the bar would Since she had no means of defense and knowing she could not outrun the beast, she tried the doctor's plan. She clapped her hands and screamed at the top of her voice, once, twice, three times.

The first time the bear hardly gave notice; the second time he looked around and up and down the bayou, and the third time ho dropped down off the log and turned around, then scampered off down the bayou from whence he came. My mother lost no time In getting to her mother's house. She learned there that the same bear had been raiding a neighbor's hog pen the night before and had eaten a whole litter of small pigs, which, no doubt, accounted for his reluctance to attack her while at the bayou." From Lima In LaGrange coun ty. Theodore F. Upson wrote; Deer were quite numerous in 1849.

and I remember seeing a few as late as 1857, but think the last one was killed near here () in 18." 9. Quite a few black bear were here in 1845. The late S. I. Williams, a banker of Lima, killed a nil) in the fall of Wolves probably (lisa'meared ii the winter of 1810.

There were coyotes roving about at the tiun-the wolves were here, but they became extinct with the wolves. S. P. Williams shot the last wildcat in 1M2. It measured about four feet in length.

The last bobcat I heard of I shot in 1 857. I saw a pair of otters that had been captured In 1 852 and they were the last of their kind that ran wild in this section, I have heard old settlers tell of seeing many beavers In the early forties. Their dams were visible when I was a boy. Badgers were quite plentiful in 1 855 and even today (1908) one Is seen occasionally. I saw the last black squirrel in 1 879 and they have long nince become extinct.

The gray squirrel Is now almost extinct in this part of the state. Tells of a Hear Hunt. "Wild turkeys were plentiful up to the late fifties. Scattered ones were found as late as 189. Wild pigeons were seen late as 189 In great numbers, hut none has been reported seen since that time." It.

M. Ilazelett wrote from Greencastle in 1894 and recounts an interesting tale of a bear bunt. "My father, In 1818, moved from Jackson county and settled In Monroe county, where I was born In October, 1819," be says. "In those days most men hunted and killed wild game more or less, and some were called hunters from the fact that they did little else but hunt for a living. One of these was James Wood.

He could not write bis own name, but preached and bunted. He, was out hunting one day when there was a 'skift' of snow on the ground and lie struck the trail of a bear, which he followed (o a rave about five miles southwest of Bloomington in Monroe county. He thought he would not be beaten, so he got my father, who was rather more a fanner than a hunter, and William Smith and Henry Wood, who were considered hunters. They all resolved to go into the cave after the bear and prepared themselves by taking their guns, shot pouches, butcher knives and steels to make fire. They made also two sluts about as big and long as a man's arm.

1 reckon von don't know what a slut Is. It Is made by taking a large wick of Itiiffalu stampede. (1) One of (he modes of Molher bear and her cubs. Anderson wrote on Dec. lfi, 1908, that deer were plentiful vp to 1873 as far south as Fowler, Benton county, Indiana.

None was seen after 18S0. From 1 870 to 1875 wolves did a great deal of damage to live stock and In 1874 this section "had its lion scare." After a concentrated hunt on the part of a large number of citizens the so-called lion turned out to be a large timber wolf, much fiercer than his prairie brothers, and this constitutes the last record of wolves in that section of the state. The last lynx heard of was in the autumn of 1871. At the present day there are to be found opossum, badger, raccoon, mink, muskrat, red fox. groundhog, squirrels and rabbits.

Hear Once I'lentilul. From Clay City, W. J. Ward wrote that a few deer were obtained In that section of the state in the late fifties. In addition there were abundant wild fowl, including prairie chickens, wild turkey and pheasants.

From Boonville, Robert White wrote in 1908 that the last wild deer killed in Warrick county was by James A. White in 1874. The last wild turkey was obtained by the same man on New Year's day, 189S. Hear had become extinct by 1842, but were plentiful in 1800. W.

fire'ory of Martinsville wrote in 1908 that the last bear found near Martinsville was in 1837. This animal gave the local hunters quite a chase, but It was finally treed and shot. Dr. U. H.

Farr of Faragon, Morgan county, reports that his mother saw several bears near Paragon from 1828 to 1832. The fortitude of the early pioneer women is evidenced In the following recital: Tracked Down ami Shot. mother came here in her teens from North Carolina and with her family settled in Monroe county, not far from Old Mt. Tabor, on Bean Blossom, about 1828. At one time she and her younger sister were helping make sugar from maple sap.

They were employed gathering the sap in a barrel on a sled which was pulled by horse. It was quite a distance from the source of the sap to the sugar camp and the pathway was along a newly made road through virgin timber and some stumpy ground. On the.