The Memoirs of John Andrews, Part 1

I inherited a typescript of the following memoirs written by my great-great grandfather at the request of one of his sons about 1920. John Andrews was born 1 April 1831 near what came to be known as Farmersville, Posey County, Indiana. He lived until 1922, dying at the age of 91 with a clear mind. His memory is remarkable and the details of his early life quite interesting to anyone who is interested in folk history. In transcribing the typescript, I changed punctuation and added words marked with square brackets. I also decided to put notes in square brackets where explanation might be helpful. Here is his story.
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School Days, 1835 to 1850

Procrastination is one of my sins. Had I commenced this memoir when my hand was steady, my eyes clear, and brain active, it is possible I could have made it interesting to those who desire to read it, and surely it would have been more pleasant to write it.

Folk portrait of sister and brother in 1840

I was born on the first day of April 1831. My sister Harriet was born some 19 months later. An older sister had passed away before or soon after my birth. My sister [Harriet] was afflicted with some trouble pertaining to female childhood, I know not what, and Father had a little wagon made, and a maid in Mother’s employ was accustomed to pull her about in it, and my first distinct memory was accompanying [them], trudging along beside. I was probably between three and four years old.

[John’s sister Ann was 20 months old when John was born and nearly 3 when she died 17 July 1832. Harriet was 18 months younger than John. Brother Seth was born when John was a month shy of 6 years old. The family lived in Posey County, at the southern tip of Indiana.]

I have no memory when I learned to read or when I first went to school, but it was surely long before a child would be enrolled as a scholar now. But I have a distinct memory of my first school and of some incidents that occurred there, and of my first teacher. I was perhaps between four or five years; the school house was heated by a large open stove. A lot of the little fellows like myself sitting around it dangling our feet from backless benches, when one day the teacher called me out and with a flat ruler in his hand took one of my hands and gave me three spats in my palm, the only time I was ever chastised in school. Why he did it, I never knew, some boyish squabble perhaps. I was too spunky to cry but turned with a smile to my grinning companions.

After two years this teacher, whose name was Felsch, left, [and] another took his place. This was many years before free schools came; the county was divided into districts with trustees to employ teachers and see to other necessary details. Often it would be only for three months. That was a term and sometimes that was the limit for school that year. If the teacher gave satisfaction he would be retained longer. Parents or guardians paid a stipulated price for each scholar enrolled. Thus my schooling went on until I was nine years old, except what Father and Mother taught me in the meantime. About this time my sister had fully regained her health, and having an active mind, our study in some branches was the same in after years. Father had taught me English grammar and I never studied it in school. In fact some of my early teachers could teach only reading, writing, and spelling.

In my sixth year Father became guardian to a cousin, Clark Butler, 4 years my senior, and after a few years we pursued the same studies together.

When I was nine years old we had a teacher for two or three terms who apparently found it necessary to instill knowledge into our youthful brains by the application of long hickory switches to wake up our dullard minds, and there were some who often felt its tingling over their shoulders. Whether it was that I was smarter than some of those who quite often had a taste of the gad, it never fell on me, but an occasional twist of the ears was the extent of my punishment.

One of the duties of the teachers in those days was to convert goose quills into pens and keep them in repair until worn out and exchanged. It is likely that the Declaration of Independence was written with the quill and perhaps also the Constitution was thus transcribed, and would it not be in harmony and justly so if the emancipation of four million slaves accomplished by the pen of Abe Lincoln, had been written by this agency? But this is perhaps a vain hope as metallic pens had then taken the place in the march of progress of the feathery quill. It is said that the cackling of geese once saved Rome. So the goose has played its part in human progress. This is wandering, yet sometimes it is pleasant to step aside from the main line and cull a flower from the fragrant bloom by the roadside.

An incident during this term of school that likely, subconsciously at least, had quite an influence on my life—in the study of arithmetic I had reached vulgar fractions and a problem soon appeared that at first appeared beyond my ability to solve. After some effort to do so I sought the aid of the teacher. Whether he would not or could not explain it I do not know. He had a key—a duplicate of the arithmetic with the examples explained—and probably this one was not included. Anyway after several attempts failed to get help, I determined myself to solve it. I worked at it for one week, and behold it was accomplished. Fractions had no more terrors for me.

This teacher was sued by the father of one of the boys he had severely thrashed and was fined one cent. Soon after that a school meeting was called and it proved a stormy one, and that night the school house burned down, whether by accident or design was not known.

After the burning of the school house, school was kept for a while in a vacant house on our farm and later in a church nearby. But conditions did not suit Father and soon after the fiasco, he took my cousin Clark and me to a school in Mount Vernon. It was several years before we attended the home school again. It was now 1841, I was ten years old. We found the school in Mount Vernon on our advent there kept in an old one room building packed full of scholars, but room was made for us. The first day was an epoch in my life—everyone but Clark perfect strangers, as was the teacher. Our studies were designated and no doubt we “Country Jakes” had the benefit of many sinister smiles and whispered jibes. The day passed. Just as the sun was preparing to don his night robes I was called up and given an example to demonstrate on the black board. It was my first appearance before that august body and my futile attempt to erase an example with my hand raised a snicker. That put the “ginger” in me. I found the sponge, cleared the board and my example soon took the place of the one obliterated. Soon school was dismissed. Darkness was stealing over the earth, and we had 3½ miles to foot it home.

Clark and I soon got in the stride and nervousness soon wore off in school, and on the playground we were accepted as good fellows.

Our teacher here was a well-educated man and as Father wished us to take Latin as one of our studies, soon we were conjugating amo and declining penna through its alternating changes from nominative to ablative. In addition we had geometry hitched on to our arithmetic. As we were put in classes we were behind in some of them and it was hard to catch up.

When we entered this school the town was building a brick two story house which they called “The Seminary,” and as soon as it was finished we moved from our crowded room to a commodious one on the second floor of this building. The Seminary was situated on rising ground on the northern end of the town which shortened our daily walk one-half mile each way. The school room was a fine one, fitted up with seats and desks for two, and heated in winter by a fireplace in one end and a stove in the middle. There was a small recitation room that was used also for storing our wraps, etc. The morning session commenced with reading by turns a chapter in the Bible and prayer by the teacher.

Original Mount Vernon Seminary, 204 F Street, NW

It was the winter term of 1841 that we entered there. It was the boys’ job to sweep, make fires, etc. in turn. In winter Clark and I had to be on the road by seven o’clock, and when our turn came to sweep and fire up, we had to start earlier, and after reaching the building one of us had to go one-half mile to get the key. In the short days of winter the stars would be showing, but if it were not raining a short hour would bring us home to a glorious feast of rich corn bread that Mother knew well how to make, baked in a skillet before the open fire, covered with a lid and red hot coals raked out from a generous fire on top, and underneath. When we reached home wet to the skin, as sometimes we did, that corn bread and a rich bowl of milk made a feast for the gods. This was before the advent of the cook stove. There was a large oven built at the side of the large fire place that Mother used for white bread, pastry, etc.

The teacher here was named Knap. A part of the routine of school work was declamation and composition on alternate Friday afternoons. The boys had to go up on the elevated stand, face the audience and deliver an oration. This at first was a fearful experience, but I soon got so that I enjoyed the situation. The girls as well as boys had to hand in compositions for correction.

Winter passed, spring and summer came and went once, twice, and a new teacher named Collins was installed with his wife as assistant. I turned 14 in 1845. This year sister Harriet was taken out of the home school and went with us to Mount Vernon during summer. We all rode back and forth in a buggy, and after that Harriet and a cousin named Sophronia Phillips (an aunt of Flora) who had lived with us for some time were boarded near the school.

Having now reached the age to help on the farm my studies through the summer were much broken up.

Schoolhouse in Farmersville, sketch by Anne Doane

In the meantime a new schoolhouse was built on the site of the burned one in Farmersville, and fitted with seats and desks, it was a great improvement over the old arrangement. Having secured the services of Mr. Welche for the new school, we never returned to Mount Vernon.

In 1846 the war with Mexico began and a number of my acquaintances volunteered and went, but all of them that I knew except one, who died there, returned. The organizing of a company and a regiment in Mt. Vernon made quite a stir. I do not know that this regiment ever was in battle, but the second in command, Alvin P. Hovey, was afterwards made Brigadier General under Grant at Vicksburg, and afterwards he was Governor of Indiana. He was a native of Posey County. [More information about Posey County military matters and Alvin P. Hovey can be found at this website.]

I was 16 now—I worked on the farm summers and went to school in winter.

This fall we had a new teacher by the name of P.K. Dibbler, and in one respect he was the best I ever had—and he had a crowded school. Quite a number of pupils from a distance took advantage of the opportunity as it was better than they could get at home, although they had to pay extra. He was also a preacher. His salary of 400 dollars was considerably increased by his preaching and outside students. He was an athlete and enjoyed the playground as much as the boys, and this added to his favor with most of the boys. But there was always carping then, and before his time expired there was trouble. He was accused of partiality by some and a hot fight—verbal—took place. As a result, at the end of his second term he quit teaching and went into other business.

Yet there was an episode in this last term perhaps worth recording. The schoolhouse was on a large corner lot and as the national holiday was near at hand, it was decided to have a celebration. The house had two front doors, one for the boys and one for the girls, and in front we built a stage, and with a bolt of domestic [a length of cotton cloth] we made a large awning, and in front we arranged tables and prepared eatables. After some songs by Clark, who was a good singer, I was called on to read the immortal Declaration, and then Mr. Dibbler gave a patriotic address. We enjoyed the feast. The platform in front was for staging a play at night. The house doors behind made a convenient dressing and retiring room. I do not remember what the play was, but we had to have a darky [a common term then that we do not endorse now] and we had a good substitute in one of the boys, and a few girls were included. A number of my old schoolmates from the Mt. Vernon school came out, and as the patriotic fever increased some were induced to declaim their former school orations.

On the whole it was a success and well done. This ended Mr. Dibbler’s term, but he was followed by another well-educated man, by name Murry, and I passed the next winter in school attending two terms of three months each.

About this time, 1848, the discovery of gold in California became for a time the absorbing topic, and in the following year the gold fever raged all over the land, as bad as the late epidemic of flu—a very poor comparison. [He was writing this just after the 1918 influenza pandemic.] A company was organized at Farmersville and some others in the county. Ox and mule teams were secured, large wagons prepared and in due time joined the long trail across the plains. Six months passed ere they reached the gold mines. Many of the animals died, and on the whole not a few of the men and women. A sad ending to many.

A few months later quite a large company went via Panama and were becalmed at Acapulco for several months, but they reached the end after five months. Many were financed, the option a divide of one half of the proceeds. Generally they secured enough to pay expenses and some over, but very few made any very rich strikes. Some returned after two or three years, others made California their home. In another place some of the gold digging will be specialized.

In 1850 a Mr. Howard, a highly educated man, found his way to Farmersville. He had a wife and 10 year old boy. He bought a large lot on which was a very nice cottage and a large shop. But all his life he had been a scholar and a teacher, with an intimate knowledge of Latin and Greek. He was as ignorant of the proper application of labor to get results from either land or machines. They brought all the way from England a lot of tools where better could have been had here. I helped him some in his planting, his little haying, etc. He had a horse that had not been used much and I think he had never graduated in horse handling as there is no doubt he had in Greek. In the fall of 1850 he was hired to teach the winter school, and that was a job he was surely able to do. He was a scholar, an expert in many branches, a wonderful penman, and in drawing, the picture of any article in view came out at the end of his pencil.

One bright winter morning soon after school opening, a girl came in with a bright smile and elastic step and seated herself by my sister Harriet. I was soon attracted by her handsome appearance, the bright eyes illuminating a very intelligent countenance. At the time I thought her to be some fifteen or sixteen years old, but long years after that I found out she had outstripped her age by several years in height. [The girl was just 10 years old at the time.] After a while I became interested in and inquired her name and obtained it from my seat mate. I also noticed that Mr. Howard was soon attracted to her, giving especial attention that looked very much like partiality. One of the studies she essayed as well as some of the rest of us was drawing. I do not think any of us would ever have produced or created any remarkable result in that direction, but from opportunity to see some of her work afterwards, I am very sure she would never have been able to astound the world with any artistic delineation, and would say here that none of the rest of us would have achieved immortality in that line and for that matter in any other.

What was the attraction that led Mr. Howard from London to Indiana I never knew. He seemed very satisfied with the change and cheerfully accepted the conditions he encountered. He and Father were congenial and often met in social intercourse. He taught but one term there but in the fall following he secured a situation in a military school in Kentucky and soon after left for that purpose. Some correspondence was kept up for a time but afterwards he was changed from the Kentucky Academy to Washington, and now we will bid him good-bye. We heard of him quite often for some time.

By this time I had learned [that] the name of the young miss specialized was Mirinda Piper and that her father was a Baptist minister who I had heard a number of times. He had a circle of churches in his charge, visiting each monthly with two day services Saturday and Sunday. Here I will note what will seem odd, especially in the cities—that the country churches then had two front doors and one back door, and as the congregation arrived, the men entered one door and women the other and took seats apart. In case one wished to leave, as was often the case in the prolonged service, they had the back door by which to escape without disturbing the audience. About the time referred to, Mr. Piper’s congregation, through his supervision, built quite a large building for that time and fashioned as above specified.

The interest Mirinda had aroused in my mind continued, and in later years continued in a union of interests via marriage, and for more than sixty years through sunshine and storm, we have happily passed. We have been blessed with three noble boys, two of whom now minister to our wants and comforts.

Here is Part 2 of the Memoirs of John Andrews.

One-Room Schools, a Romance, an Earthquake

Here is an excerpt from Mirinda Piper Andrews’ memoirs from 1849 through 1851. I inherited a typed copy of these memoirs from my father, who got them from his grandfather, Mirinda’s youngest son. The illustrations are from the internet and are in the public domain or credited.

Notes: Posey County is in the extreme southwest corner of Indiana bordered on the west by the Wabash River and on the south by the Ohio River. Mirinda's father, Beverly Bradley Piper, was a traveling Baptist minister. The Piper family consisted of her parents: B.B. and Delia Deborah Norton Piper; herself (Mirinda), Asa, Charles, and baby Anne. Mirinda turned 9 in July 1849.
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New Harmony, by Karl Bodmer, 1839

In the spring of 1849 we moved to Posey County, Indiana, five miles from New Harmony. We rented a small farm, and Father during the week did farm work and preached Saturdays and Sundays. I again commenced going to school. The distance was more than a mile through the deep woods, but there were some other children near us who attended, and I rarely went alone. Our teacher was a young gentleman. There were some hills and large rocks some distance away from the schoolhouse that we children very much wished to visit, but the teacher forbade our going, as there was a dangerous creek to cross to get there and we might fall in and get drowned. But one day at noon six or seven of us were on the banks of the creek, and we wanted to go over and visit the rocks so bad we concluded to go anyway, first taking the precaution for each one to solemnly promise never to tell. We crossed on a log very easily, and had a good run over the hills and rocks, and then started back. What was our horror to find while we were absent the creek had risen, and the water was flowing over the log! We had to cross it, for it was the only place we knew of for miles where we could cross at all. They all got over safely but me. I slipped off the log, but they got me out somehow and wrung out my clothes the best they could, but we were dreadfully afraid the teacher would find it out and punish us all. But he did not or at least did not say anything about it. I think if we had had a lady teacher she would have noticed my wet dress and brought us to time.


The school house was an old log affair, the windows were all on one side and writing desks in front of them. The seats were benches without any back to them. The teacher made our pens out of goose quills and wrote our copy. But we learned just as fast as if we had all the modern improvements.

In the spring of 1850 we moved to another part of Father’s circuit, three miles from Mount Vernon, Posey County, Indiana, at Farmersville. Father bought a farm here, we were all very much pleased to have a home of our own, the first one we had owned.

Census page taken by B. B. Piper with
Anson Seeley Andrews and family on it

That summer Father took the census of the county, and when I wasn’t in school, I spent much of my time reading the notes he had taken, for him and an assistant to copy on the schedules. I was very proud to be of help to Father, and he was kind enough to let me think that it was a great help to him. Our school only lasted three months during the summer, so I worked for him during the fall months until he sent in the returns.

Our school teacher this summer was Miss Sarah Stevens, daughter of the Mr. Stevens of Stringtown [in Vanderburgh County, the next county to the east on the Ohio River] before mentioned. She was a young lady about twenty years old and very pretty, her eyes and hair were black, her complexion fair, her cheeks rosy, and she was very good natured. She boarded at our house as we were old acquaintances. The school house was one mile and a quarter away. I had the pleasure of walking to school with her every day.

During the summer Mother’s brother Dr. Wellington B. Norton visited us, greatly to our delight. I supposed he came to see us, but two years later I discovered that his visit was quite as much to the fair Sarah, and I presume Mother knew it at the time. [Wellington B. Norton and Miss Sarah Stevens were married in November 1852. Sadly, he died in the spring of 1853.]

Our school house was a frame building with a desk for each seat. The Baptists had been holding their meetings in it. That summer they erected a church building. One evening we were at meeting in the school house, Father was preaching, when all of a sudden, we felt the building shake, and the windows rattled. Father paused a moment and remarked, “It is an earthquake,” and then went on with his sermon as if nothing had happened. When we arrived at home we found Mother and the little ones had been quite frightened, thinking someone had been trying to get in to the house, but finally Mother had thought what it was. It was the only earthquake shock I ever felt.

Log houses in New Harmony, Indiana

Our house was small, but most of our neighbors had small houses too, so it did not trouble us. We had the inevitable large fireplace. Father used to roll in a big back log (in the winter), put the heavy iron and irons in front of it, put some large sticks of wood on them, and we would have a roaring fire. But most of the heat went up the chimney so the room wouldn’t be very warm after all.

Miss Stevens went home in the fall. The school directors would not give her the winter term, for there were to be a lot of young men to attend school who worked on farms in the summer, and they wanted a man teacher. Mr. Howard, an Englishman, secured the position; he was a finely educated man and a very interesting teacher. I had made up my mind that I would not go to school that winter but study at home. I was only ten years old, but my parents were always so kind, I supposed they would give up to me if I teased them enough, but I was mistaken. They insisted on my starting to Mr. Howard’s school the first day. I cried considerable about it, but all to no purpose. It seemed to be fate, for that winter John Andrews attended school, whom I afterwards married. It was the only school I ever went where he did, and I don’t think he spoke to me during the term. I am quite sure I did not wish him to, for at that time I just about hated boys, except my brothers.

Mr. Howard took a great deal of pains with my education, and drilled me long and faithfully on my penmanship, but all to no purpose, as you will see by this manuscript. I never could learn to write well. I took drawing lessons at this school more to please Mother than anything else, as she was a natural artist, but I never had any taste that way, and of course it was just time wasted.

A sketch of the Farmersville School by Anne Doane

Where I went to school was a small village at a cross roads named Farmersville, but it had two other names, “The Corners” and “Yankeetown,” as there were several families of Eastern people settled there. In one of the corners made by the crossroads was situated the farm of Anson S. Andrews (the village contained a store, gristmill, blacksmith shop, church, school house, and several dwelling houses). His farm was the best one in the neighborhood and the house was in a beautiful location. The family consisted of himself, wife, and three children, John, Harriet, and Seth. The boys were intelligent and respected. Harriet was very pretty; indeed I have heard Father say that she was the prettiest girl in the county, anyway she was one of the best and sweetest girls I ever knew.

[Editor’s Note: Most of the settlers of southern Indiana had come from Southern states; however, Anson Seeley Andrews was born in Connecticut and his wife was from Massachusetts.]

We were not much acquainted with the Andrews family, for our society was nearly all Baptists, or people who leaned that way, and they were neither. Mr. Andrews was a man of importance in the county; he owned part of the store and mill and was an educated man, but he was getting old and did not live many years from that time. He died in 1854. The only acquaintance I had with the young people while we lived in that neighborhood was at Mr. Howard’s school.

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The Piper family moved away from Posey County after three years there, and their further adventures will be the subject of more entries here:

Mirinda and Slavery

The Further Adventures of Mirinda Piper (part 1)

The Further Adventures of Mirinda Piper, (part 2)

Mirinda Piper's Adventures as a Young Lady of the 1850s