Estes Genealogies - Stew Estes

1840 US Census for Lebanon Township, Lawrence County, Arkansas: Thomas Estes, Burres Estes (Jr.), and John Estes [sons of Burroughs and Martha (Lloyd) Estes.

1850 US Census for Lawrence County, Arkansas: Thomas and Irena (Malone) Estes.

1850 US Census for Lawrence County, Arkansas: Burres and Martha (Lloyd) Estes; Rebecca (Wiles) Estes; Sarah (Estes) Falkenbery.

1850 US Census for Fulton County, Arkansas: John and Nancy (Jackson) Estes; and Lemuel and Martha (Estes) Morris [children of Burroughs and Martha (Lloyd) Estes].

1860 US Census for Fulton County, Arkansas: James and Rebecca Estes.

1860 US Census for Henry County, Tennessee: James and Susan (Susannah Estes) Hastings [sister of Thomas¹⁰Estes].

1860 US Census for Walla Walla County, Washington Territory: T.J. (Jonathan T.) and Nancy (E. Estes) [daughter of Thomas and Irene]. William W. and Frances (Morris) Wiseman [brother of J.T.], [daughter of Martha10 Estes and Lemuel Morris].

1860 US Census for Polk County, Oregon: Isaac (Jr.) and Orlena (Williams) Staats; A.L. (Archibald) Hastings; Robert and Susan (Estes) Tarter.

1860 US Census for Chico, Butte County, California: H.M. (Hardy) and A. (Ann Estes) Long with Thomas (W.) Estes [children of Thomas and Irene/Millie].

1870 US Census for Fulton County, Arkansas: Rebecca (Nolan) Estes; Calvin and Milly (Wiles) Estes.

1870 US Census for Walla Walla County, Washington Territory: Thomas and Irene (Malone) Estes; David R. and Elizabeth (Estes) King.

1870 US Census for Walla Walla County, Washington Territory: Ann (Estes) Cope; F.M. and Irene (Estes) Gibbins; Thomas and Louisa (Paul) Estes; J.T. and Nancy (Estes) Wiseman.

1880 US Census for Walla Walla County, Washington Territory: Thomas and Irene Estes.

1880 US Census for Polk County, Oregon: R. (Robert) and Susan (Estes) Tarter; and, J.C. (John Campbell) Hastings [son on Ann Hannah¹⁰ Estes].

1880 US Census for Walla Walla County, Washington Territory: Thomas Estes and sons John, Hugh, Winchester and Cader [Clyde farm]; and Thomas and Louisa (Paul) Estes.

1880 US Census for Union County, Oregon: Thomas N[ewton] and Julia (Tucker) Estes [son of James and Mary Estes].

1880 US Census for Heppner, Umatilla County, Oregon: Mary M. (Estes) Long and children [daughter of Thomas and Millie (Cate) Estes]. J.T. (Jonathan) and Nancy (E. Estes) [daughter of Thomas and Irene].

1880 US Census for Fulton County, Arkansas: J.M. (James Madison) and Mary (McCord) Estes; Calvin and Rebecca Estes; John F. and Sarah Estes.

1885 Lincoln County, Washington Territory, Territorial Census: F.M. (Francis) and I.E. (Irene E. Estes) Gibbins.

1900 US Census for Pleasant Ridge [Agnos], Fulton County, Arkansas: James M. (Madison) and Mary (McCord) Estes; William Estes (son).

1900 US Census for Mitchellville, Manatee County, Florida: John (Franklin) and Mary (Alderman) Estes; David and Florida (Gilley) Alderman.

1900 US Census for Walla Walla, Walla Walla County, Washington: J.T. Wiseman (Jonathan Tipton) and Nancy (Estes) Wiseman.

1910 US Census for Manatee, Manatee County, Florida: John F. and Mary (Alderman) Estes and children.

1910 US Census for Walla Walla County, Washington: Hugh (Pinckney) and Mary (Woods) Estes, [son of Thomas and Irene] [three entries].

1910 US Census for Pennington County, South Dakota: Hugh P. (Prior, Sr.) and Emma (Southerland) Estes, [brother of James M.].

1910 US Census for Richwoods Township, Sharp County, Arkansas: Hugh P. (Pryor) and Josa A. (Bristow) Estes, [son of James M. and Mary].

1910 US Census for Walla Walla, Walla Walla County, Washington: Cader D. (T.) and Sadie A. (Peugh) Estes [son of Thomas and Irene].

1910 US Census for Baker City, Baker County, Oregon: Harry and Myrtle M. (Estes) Brooks [daughter of Hugh Pinckney Estes and Mary Woods]

1910 US Census for Walla Walla, Walla Walla County, Washington: L. Winn and Viola (Woods) Estes [son of Lycurgus and Viola Estes]

1910 US Census for King County, Washington: Thomas W. Estes [son of Thomas and Irene Estes].

1910 US Census for Walla Walla, Walla Walla County, Washington: Clyde and Gertrude (Hammond) Estes [son of Lycurgus and Viola Estes]

1920 US Census for Astoria, Clatsop County, Oregon: Harry and Myrtle M. (Estes) Brooks [daughter of Hugh Pinckney Estes and Mary Woods]

1920 US Census for Bradenton, Manatee County, Florida: John (Franklin) and Mary (Alderman) Estes [son of James M. and Mary A. Estes].

1910 US Census for Walla Walla County, Washington: Hugh (Pinckney) and Mary (Woods) Estes, [son of Thomas and Irene] [three entries].

1910 US Census for Pennington County, South Dakota: Hugh P. (Prior, Sr.) and Emma (Southerland) Estes, [brother of James M.].

1910 US Census for Richwoods Township, Sharp County, Arkansas: Hugh P. (Pryor) and Josa A. (Bristow) Estes, [son of James M. and Mary].

1930 US Census for Del Rey, Maricopa County, Arizona: Arles F. and Mattie E. (Wolf) Estes, and Marvin Wolf [her brother].

1683 St Stephen’s Parish Petition: Abraham Estes [1^st Column, 9^th from top. John Madison, father of Ambrose, 3d from bottom ]

1732 Will of Ambrose Madison. [Estes neighbor, grandfather of future President James Madison].

D.A.R. Application re Service of Thomas Estes II, Number 747111.

1822 Land Grant of 640 Acres to Burris Estes, Sr., Henry County, Tennessee [Service of Moses “Eastes”].

1828 Deed from Burris Estes, Sr. to son Thomas Estes, Henry County, Tennessee Land.

1829 Will of Burris Estes, Sr.

Map of Burris Estes, Sr. Division of 640 Acre Land Grant to sons Thomas, Burris, Jr. and John. [By W.A. “Bill” Estes].

1851 Oregon Trail Story (Otis and Eisele).

19 October 1855 Puget Sound Courier, “Call for Volunteers,’ for Yakima Indian War.

2 July 1856 Muster Roll, 2d Regiment, Washington Territorial Volunteers, Lt. John H. Estes, (No. 3 on list), Enlisted 2 June 1856 at Vancouver: Horse $325, saddle $50, bridle $8.

2 August 1856 Muster Roll, 2d Regiment, Washington Territorial Volunteers, Lt. John H. Estes “Killed in Battle, 15 July 1856, Burnt River, Oregon.”

22 August 1856. Pioneer and Democrat Newspaper, Olympia, Washington Territory, Friday, (Death of Lt. John H. Estes)

1859 Letter from James and Jerlean Patterson [mentions Thomas Estes and Millie Cate].

1862 Oregon Trail Story: Louisa J. (Paul) Estes [wife of Thomas W. Estes, son of Thomas and Irene Estes].

24 April 1862 Homestead Patent: U.S. to Thomas Estes, Walla Walla County, Washington 40 Acres.

20 May 1862 Homestead Patent: U.S. to Thomas Estes, Walla Walla County, Washington 158 Acres.

8 November 1877 Deed: Thomas Estes to John F. Boyer, Walla Walla County, Washington.

5 May 1881 Receipt: Thomas Estes, $398.⁰⁸ for 159 Acres.

Biographies of Jonathan T. Wiseman and Nancy E. Estes, from Parsley, Dancing with Mules, p.358.

1882-1936: Estes Marriage Records, Walla Walla County, Washington.

1890’s?: Walla Walla Township Map (Hugh P. Estes, Parcel Nos. 22 & 27).

1892-1895 Washington National Guard Register, 2d Regiment, I Company: Cader Tipton Estes and Sydney Estes [Sons of Thomas and Irene.]

1907-1960: Various Estes Vital Records.

1911 Correspondence between W.H. “Harry” Brooks [husband of Myrtle Estes, daughter of Hugh Pinckney Estes] and T.C. Elliott (Oregon Historical Society Research Library, T.C. Elliott Collection, Box 5, Folder 6, Mss. 231].

20 December 1925: Letter from John F. Estes to wife Mary Christenia “Tenie” (Alderman) Estes.

1916-1961: Misc. Estes Obituaries.

Nicholas Tarter, Sketch of the Thomas Estes Family (Manuscript, 7 January 1940)(with annotations by Hugh J. Estes).

Lake View Cemetery Plot Map: Thomas W. and Louisa Estes Sec. 1, No. 1008; Claude and Lochie Estes, Sect 7, No. S ½ 992

Cope Ancestry Chart.

1959-1967: Various Newspaper Clippings, L. Donald Estes [son of Arles, son of John Franklin, son of James Madison].

c.1986 Letter from Edward Hugh Callow to Kathleen Wendland [Grandson of Hugh Pinckney Estes].

"From nearby Liberty, Missouri, in early April 1846, about fifty families prepared to make the journey to the far away Oregon Territory, which then included what is now the states of Oregon, Washington, Idaho and part of Nevada. My father, Benjamin [Franklin] Munkers [1799 Tenn.], was among them. His family was composed of an invalid wife [Mary “Polly” Crowley born 1802], three married sons and one married daughter, besides five younger children, the youngest a boy of five years. I was then ten years old and still have quite a clear memory of the journey and of conditions of the early days spent in Oregon.

All the way across, Mother was unable to do anything, even having to be lifted in and out of the wagon. She made the entire ride on a bed. It was my work to help brother's wife, who managed the cooking for our camp.

The Munkers family started out with five wagons drawn by oxen; three yoke to each wagon, thirty head of oxen, fifty head of roan Durham cows and five saddle horses. These made up our herd. Most all the company drove through some stock but I think no other family had so many as we.

When we left Missouri, there was a train of about one hundred wagons but that was found to be too large a party to travel together as the teams must be kept up by grazing by the way. So they scattered out under leaders or train captains, as we called them. When we started, a man by the name of Martin was our Captain. Later when our train was much smaller, Ben Simpson, father of Sam L. Simpson, was our head man. The future Poet of Oregon was then Baby Sam of the camp. Many a time I cared for him while his mother was doing the family wash.

After we left Missouri, all the buildings I remember seeing were Forts Larami, Bridges and Hall. As this was but the second year of "Crossing the Plains", the way before us was much of it through a wilderness and over a trackless plain. There were no bridges, no ferries and a stream too large to be forded was crossed by means of rafts, if there could be found timber along its banks to make rafts. If not, our wagon beds were used for flat boats.

We had no trouble with the Indians but we did have one awful scare. It was when we were in Utah. All at once our train seemed to be surrounded on all sides by mounted Indians! It was a war party going out to fight another tribe. I do believe there were ten thousand of them and we thought it was the last of us, but when they had seen us all they wanted to, they gave a whoop and a yell and away they clattered!

Of those long weary months I cannot clearly tell. I know it was April when we started and October when we reached the place that was to be our home in Oregon. Sometimes we stopped several days in camp where we found plenty of water and good grazing and while the teams rested and fed up, the men fixed up the wagons and helped the women wash and prepare food for the next drive ahead. Then there were days we toiled over the arid plains till far into the night to reach the life-giving water that was a necessity to us and to our trains. The children of the company walked many many miles....sometimes I think I walked half of the way to Oregon! Some days it was very hard to find fuel enough for our camp fires. Many a time our simple meals were cooked over a fire of buffalo chips and sage brush. The weather did not cause as much trouble. I recall but one real storm. It was on the Platte River in Nebraska. We were in camp on the bank of the river when it came on. The wind blew a hurricane! Thunder roared and lightening flashed! It was a dark as Egypt. The rain poured like it was being emptied from buckets. I will never forget that night! Every tent was blown down. No one was seriously hurt, though a babe was narrowly missed by a falling tent pole. The men chained the wagons together to hold them from being blown into the river. Our camp belongings were blown helter skelter over the country around about and our stock was stampeded 'till it took all the next day to get them rounded up.

But after all, we had but few hardships compared with some of the emigrant trains. Some years, you know, there was Cholera that wiped out entire families and trains that were raided by Indians and too, there were times when the oxen were diseased and died leaving families stranded on the plains. Yes, we were very lucky!

In the early Autumn we reached the Columbia River and we drove down through the Barlow Pass and came into the Willamette Valley. We made camp there where the Swartz place is now. Father was anxious to secure a place where he could have shelter for the invalid mother and when he found a chance to buy out a homesteader (a man by the name of Anderson) he was glad to pay him his price ($1000) and take possession at once. The place was on Mill Creek, four miles East of Salem. there was a comfortable log house of two rooms, a log barn and ten of the 640 acres was farmed. Thus, before the winter rains came on we were snuggly settled. Father brought in what supplies he could for the house and for our stock, but most of the cattle were turned on the range.

The first winter's work was making rails with which to fence the farm. Then followed sod breaking and seeding, thus adding some acres each year to our fields. Father set out an orchard of apple and peach trees in the spring of 1850, I think it was. I don't remember where he got the nursery stock. He brought a half bushel of peach stones from Missouri. The orchard grew nicely and I think it was in the autumn of 1855 that father had 100 bushes of apples to sell. Fourteen dollars was the price he got per bushel. I do not often hear it spoken of now, but there was a time in the settlement where we lived when peas and wheat were currency. I cannot now say what the face value was, but I think one bushel either represented $1.00 in debit or credit. Peas were much used for coffee and often the only sweetening to be had was molasses.

Oh no, we were not poor! Father brought $10,000 to this country. How? In gold and silver. You know mother was brought on a bedstead set right into the wagon. Well, underneath her bed was a box of bedding and in that box, the money was cached. Yes, we soon had pretty good homes started but the stampede to the gold mines in California in 1849-50 was a bad thing for our families. Four of my brothers went (Thomas, 14 years old / Ben, 16 years old / Riley, 19 years old and Marion). Marion later died there. They would all have gotten ahead faster had they stayed home.

Where did I go to school? I did not have much chance to go to school after we came here. One winter the neighbors got up a school. There was a vacant house and they hired a man to teach the children awhile. I went. That was about all the schooling I had after I came to Oregon.

What became of those who crossed the plains in our train? Well, the Crowleys settled in Polk County and the Fullerson's also as well as Glenn Burnett, our train preacher. The Browns, the Blakelys the Finleys and the Kirks settled in Linn County. Ben Simpson and family lived in Salem. Yes, I know most all the old timers. L.F. Grover, afterward Governor of Oregon and US Senator was a guest at my wedding. Reverend Roberts, one of the early pioneers of Methodism performed the ceremony.

Do I remember the hard winter and the great flood of 1861 & 1862? Yes! What was the worst winter and the greatest flood in all the years I've lived here. Much of Salem was under water. The Court House was full of people who had been driven from their homes. Near the old Bennett house, the water was swimming to a horse. The Willamette was a mighty river...miles in width, sweeping houses, barns, bridges and everything in its course. No, of course the river hadn't been bridged then, but then all the small streams were adding wreckage to the Willamette. The flood was in December '61. In January came the deep snow which lasted for six weeks and pretty nearly finished what the flood had left.

Mr. & Mrs. Huffman were interviewed at their home on the south fork of the Mary's River [sometime during 1938-39] where they are living in a home near that of their son, Chester. Their memories seemed dependable. Mr. Huffman said:

My father was Jesse G. Huffman. Mother's maiden name was Morning Estes. They came from Missouri to Oregon in 1847, in spirit of adventure to see the country so much talked about. They did not like the climate in Missouri. They crossed the plains with ox teams and were six months on the road but had no trouble with Indians.

Father took a donation land claim near Aurora and set out an orchard. When the orchard came into bearing he sold the apples in California. He commonly got $10 per bushel and sometimes as much as $12.50. There were no pests in the country then and it was easy to raise apples. Indians were few and peaceable. Sometimes the farmers hired them to work.

I was born in 1851. In 1865 William Kyle founder of the Aurora Colony of Germans, bought most of the land about Aurora, including father's claim. The Germans were good people, industrious, hard working, and good farmers, but very clannish.

Father then came to Benton County and settled on the south fork of Marys River. He built a sawmill on a creek coming down from the hills to the north. When I became old enough I worked in this mill and later took it over myself.

Of father's seven children, only myself and one sister, Sarah (Mrs. Tunnecliff) lived to an adult age. One brother died in the early twenties, the others in childhood. A great scourge in the early days was putrid sore throat, which I suppose was a very bad type of diphtheria. Some times all the children in a family would be wiped out. Oliver Cone lost four children. Doctors were scarce and sometimes not up to date in their practice

I went first to the district school near Aurora. The school was on one corner of our place. There were only 10 or 12 pupils. I remember the Eberhart and McClue families. I forgot the names of the teachers. Our farm adjoined Pudding River where it forms the Clackamas county line. I attended the Pleasant Valley school near here. The teachers were John Woodand Ezra Wyatt.

The lumber we sawed in out mill sold at from ten to twelve and sometimes fifteen dollars per thousand feet. We picked only sound clear logs for the mill. There were no restrictions then and we did not have to cut all the trees as we came, or use all the tree if parts were not good. We sawed mostly clear lumber, there would be no knots except near the heart of the log. Our mill cut about 2000 feet in a ten hour shift. Sometimes we would saw both day and night and cut as much as 4000 feet a day. It kept us hustling to sell this much, and we made it a rule never to let the lumber accumulate.

"This is the best world I ever lived in. New ideas will bring improvement. There have been no radical changes but a gradual development. People generally are making an effort to bring their children up right. There are always some bad, but no general movement in that direction. If a man is to amount to anything he must start right and be good from boyhood. There is not much chance of reform after one is grown."

"My parents were Francis Spencer and Annie Blalock, who crossed the plains in 1864. Mother was not related, I believe, to the Doctor Blalock who was a pioneer in the Walla Walla country, and whose name was given to an island in the mid-Columbia. I was 12 years old at that time. They left Missouri on account of the war. Father was in sympathy with the Union, but he did not want to fight his neighbors. He feared he would be drafted and so he came away. He had heard Oregon was a good country, and he came here to be at peace. He bought 80 acres of school land on the hills by the south fork of Marys River and there passed his life. Father had nine children. The boys were Jim, Jesse, Bill, Frank and Eli. The girls were Harriet, Annie, Sarah and Ruth. Although the farm was small there was always plenty at our house. Range was plenty and free for the cattle, and father raised Timothy hay on the farm for such seasons as he needed feed. The garden and orchard helped and father like to hunt.

"I went. to the Pleasant Valley school about the time my husband did, and I had the teachers he mentioned. Nothing much was taught but reading, writing and arithmetic.

"Game was plentiful in the early days. Cougars were not as common here as they were further West. I have known of but two that were killed on the south fork of Marys River."

“Cross country travel was hard and hazardous 60 years ago and there are not many pioneers of that date left to tell us about the adventures and hardships they encountered in making long trips into new country, but here is a story told by one of these old-timers who is now 86 years old.

She is Isabelle Moore Estes of Day, Ark., and Waco, Texas. She was born in Tennessee, near Dyersburg, in 1857, and came to Arkansas with her parents when she was two years old. She grew up near Day post-office in what is now Izard County. She attended the first free school taught in that part of Arkansas, her father, Daniel D. Moore, being the teacher. When she was 17 years old she married David G. Estes and when she was 21 she went with her husband in a covered wagon to Idaho. Most of the western part of the trip was made over the old Oregon Trail.

In talking about the experiences of her early life, Mrs. Estes said that she and her husband were finding it pretty hard going in the spring of 1878. They had a little boy two years old and a baby six months old. Her husband was cutting rails for 25 cents a hundred and they were paying a dollar a bushel for wheat for their bread.

One night David came in from work and said, "Isabelle, I believe I like biscuits better than anything else in the world, but this is a hard way of getting them. Let's go to the wheat country of the Northwest and grow our own." Mrs. Estes required little urging to agree to the adventure. Preparations were begun at once for the long trip that kept them traveling the remainder of that spring, through the summer and early fall - a trip which is now made in three or four days over our fine highways - or was before gasoline rationing.

The Estes were joined on the expedition by the Dan Moore family (cousins), consisting of the father, mother, six children, ranging in age from 12 years down to six months, and a hired man. The Moores took two wagons but the Estes had only one wagon with a change of horses.

With all their plans made, provisions assembled and packed, the two families made the start late in April on journey that was to carry them through months of adventure, thrills, hardships and sorrows to their destination - the little town of Moscow in western Idaho, near the Washington state line.

They traveled but a few miles the first day and spent the first night scarcely outside their own neighborhood. The next night they camped near Salem, about 25 miles farther on.

"Two of my husband's friends were doing jury duty, as court was in session," said Mrs. Estes, "and they rode out and spent the night with us. They bade us good-bye and wished us luck the next morning and we moved on toward Springfield, Mo, feeling that now we really were leaving home, friends and familiar faces."

In the course of four or five days the little party arrived at Springfield, which then was a thriving, good-sized town. At this point they were joined by the Sheridan Massey family. (Many of Mr. Massey's descendants are prominent in the affairs of North Arkansas today.)

At Springfield a tent and a few other conveniences were added to their equipment, and the small train of five wagons really began its long trek. "We encountered our first mishap a few days after leaving Springfield," Mrs. Estes said. "We had crossed the Neosho river and made our camp too near the river. During the night a terrible rainstorm came up. Before we realized our situation there was from four to 10 inches of water in our tent. We hastily broke camp and in the midst of the downpour moved to the Masseys' camp on higher ground. They had a stove and we spent the next day, Sunday, drying out.

As they traveled on to Fort Scott, their road sometimes led them through beautiful wheat fields and Mrs. Estes remembers they bought corn in Kansas for 15 cents a bushel. Wheat was cheaper than in Arkansas and butter could be had for eight cents a pound. The Moores were taking two cows with them to furnish milk for their children en route, but they had to sell the cows in Colorado when their feet become too sore to travel.

The travelers stopped one day out of the week to wash and clean up in general. The men would take advantage of these stops to hunt.

"Fresh meat was always appreciated and especially when our provisions began to run low." said Mrs. Estes. "We could buy flour, sugar and coffee at certain points, but these staples sold at high prices. Meat we could not get as we got farther west, and there wasn't much game that our inexperienced hunters could get except jack rabbits, and they were a sorry excuse for meat. Once in a great while we would get an antelope, and they were good, but most of the time we were without meat." They saw no buffalo, but depended on buffalo chips for fuel across the prairies.

In Colorado, the Moores lent a horse and saddle to a resident and sent their hired man with him for elk, but in three days they came back without an elk and Mrs. Estes said that was a great disappointment to them all.

The Massey family were all grownups, so in Colorado they decided to go on ahead, as the Moores and Estes were frequently delayed because of sickness among their children.

"But we never lacked traveling companions for long," Mrs. Estes said, "Shortly after they left us, we were joined by a party of five men who were traveling for their health. One of their number had tuberculosis, or consumption, as we then called it. They were well equipped for traveling with a stout light wagon and I marveled at their many conveniences to make their `housekeeping' easy."

Somewhere in Wyoming the eldest Moore child developed mountain fever but the families traveled on until he become so ill that they were forced to stop near Green River City. Here the boy died and was buried.

"I shall always remember how kind the townspeople were to us," said Mrs. Estes. "Although we were strangers, several came out and sat up with us, bringing their own midnight refreshments. My babies became very sick, and I could not attend the funeral. It was a grief-stricken little band that moved on after our first casualty. To add to the gloom of our low spirits, a total eclipse of the sun made it all seem ominous and foreboding to us." We didn't know then that mountain fever was caused by a tick bite and that more trouble lay ahead for us."

When the travelers reached Fort Hall the government troops halted them and would not allow them to proceed until a train was collected for their protection against the Indians. The Bannock Indians were giving some trouble in that section of the country at the time and it was not safe to travel in small groups. In two days a train of 30 wagons had collected and they were allowed proceed.

Among those who traveled with them out of Fort Hall was a family of civilized Indians - Chief Yellowhawk, his squaw and little son and a young man. Mrs. Estes does not know to what tribe they belonged, but they were from a reservation in Oregon and had been to Colorado to recover some stolen horses. They had about 15 horses in their possession and were taking them back to the reservation. These Indians traveled on horseback, of course, and when they came to rivers to be ferried, they removed their clothing, put on breach cloths and swam the streams with their horses. Chief Yellowhawk told Mrs. Estes that he was 70 snows old.

"We never saw any other Indians in this supposed-to-be-dangerous territory," said Mrs. Estes, "but our Indian companions reported seeing Indians every day. They rode the ridges and higher ground to the right and left of the train and saw everything, where we with our untrained eyes, would have seen very little."

After they had passed through the danger zone and it was no longer necessary to keep together for protection, the wagon train broke up. The Moores and Estes were again traveling alone when Mrs. Moore and her baby became desperately ill.

They stopped at a stage station on the Snake River, where the stages stopped to change their tired horses for fresh ones. There was no one except two men who took care of the horses. The men told them about a doctor who ran a ferry, about tow miles down the river, but when he came, he had no medicine. He sent to Boise City, about 75 miles distant, for it, but before it arrived Mrs. Moore had succumbed to mountain fever the third day after their stop.

"I was the only woman within 75 miles," Mrs. Estes said: "so my husband and I prepared the body for burial, and the two men at the station found some rough boards and made a coffin."

The baby was not expected to live and its mother left instructions for them to knock the rockers off its cradle and bury the baby in it. This they did when it followed its mother in death two days after her burial. But the day before the baby died some welcomed travelers came into camp - a man, his wife and twin sons, about 16 years old, Mrs. Estes said, "I can not tell you how glad I was to see another woman at this time."

When they had buried the baby, they started on again, though by this time Mrs. Estes and her baby were very ill. After they had traveled for several days she became too ill to go farther, so they stopped on a large sheep ranch near Summerville, Oregon.

The Moores, who were about out of provisions and money, pushed on and left the Estes there. The rancher and his wife were very kind to them. They moved the family into a vacant house on the ranch, so that Mrs. Estes could have better shelter, gave them hay for their horses, and offered Mr. Estes a good job if they would stay with them.

"My husband did help," said Mrs. Estes, "as long as we stayed with them, but we were anxious to get on to the little Idaho community we had set out for, as my husband's father and step-mother lived there. They had made this same trip several years before when it was even more hazardous; however, my husband's stepmother was a native of western Canada and was accustomed to dealing with the Indians."

When Mrs. Estes was able, they traveled on to Walla Walla, Washington, and after a day or two of rest they started on the last lap of their long journey. Mr. Estes had a relative in Walla Walla, a Dr. John Morris, who insisted on sending his man and a couple of horses with them to help them cover a hard climb they had to make in getting across the mountains into Idaho. This was one of the hardest passes of their trip and it would have been difficult to make it without this help. Winter was setting in early and there was much snow in the mountains. They arrived at their destination, Moscow, Idaho, on the second day of October, 1878, with two of the horses with which they left Arkansas; the other two had been swapped in Colorado.

Thus ended a long journey that had brought this little family to a new home. They were soon settled on a ranch where they began the business of growing wheat. They prospered and, "incidentally," said Mrs. Estes, "my husband had plenty of biscuits."

Although the Esteses lived and prospered in Idaho about 10 years, they were homesick for Arkansas. Wishing to live among their old friends again, they decided to return. This time they made the journey by train.

Mrs. Estes said she marveled at the contrast of their quick return trip and the long, hard journey they had made to the West 10 years before. They came out of Idaho on the new Northern Pacific which was then nearing completion to the coast. The Frisco railroad was being built down Spring River in Arkansas, but it was completed only to Thayer, Mo., about two miles from Mammoth Spring, Ark. They left the train there and resorted again to wagon travel to reach their old home, about 40 miles away.

Mr. Estes died a few years after their return to Arkansas and Mrs. Estes was left with a large family to rear. She is still an active woman for her age - 86 - and she has just recently made a trip alone to California to the bedside of a sick son and returned. She divides her time between Texas and Arkansas, usually spending her winters in Texas and her summers in Arkansas.

Near the close of the Eighteenth Century there lived in the State of North Carolina a family by the name of Estes. The father and mother in this family later became my maternal great-grandparents. I have heard of only two sons and two daughters of this family, though there may have been several other children.

The four of whom I can speak are Thomas Estes, my maternal grandfather, who was born in North Carolina on November 11, 1799, his brother, John Estes; and two sisters, Patsy and Hannah Estes.

I am not informed whether the whole Estes family moved to Tennessee or not, but do know that the four of whom I have spoken settled in Henry County, Tennessee, early in the Nineteenth Century, where Grandfather married (according to my best information) early in the year 1820. His first wife's name was either Sarah Kirkland or Emily Lloyd. I have heard my mother say that her oldest sister's name was Sarah Kirkland, and I understood that she was named for her mother. To strengthen this thought is the fact that Grandfather's oldest daughter by his second wife was named Ann Malone, the name "Malone" being for her mother. I did not know any of the family differed with me in regard to the name until long after Mother's death, and after I was fifty years of age. However, sister Sarah E. Staats claims that she heard Mother say that her mother's maiden name was Emily Lloyd. (Note: Neither name is correct. These names may have been confused with their two grandmothers; Martha "Patsy" Lloyd and Sally Andrews. Sarah Kirkland Estes was known as "Sallie." Thomas signed marriage bond to Milly Cates on November 4, 1820, in Orange County, North Carolina.)

Grandfather and his second wife, Irania Malone, were married on April 15, 1833, according to record in her old Bible. As I recall that Mother said her father married the second time in a little less than a year after the death of his first wife. I can say that my maternal grandmother died in 1832, when Mother was three years of age.

Grandfather had five children by his first wife; namely, Burris, born sometime in 1821; James, born in 1823; Sarah, born April 7, 1825; Mary, born March 23, 1827; and Susan, born April 7, 1829. (Note: James Madison Estes was born August 31, 1821. Census records indicate that Burris was also born about the same time. It may be they were twins.)

John Estes married Nancy Jackson, and to them were born six children: Emeline (Estes) Orr; Martha (Estes) Orr; Joseph Estes; Susan (Estes) Sebring; Winsey (Estes) Rose; and Burris Estes, who was born in Oregon. The family came to Oregon with my father's family in 1853. John Estes was killed by the Indians during the Yakima Indian War of 1856, as I understand, a few miles above Wallula, Washington, on the Oregon side.

Patsy Estes married a Mr. Morris. She, with her family, came to the Walla Walla country with Grandfather Estes in 1861. I never heard of but two of her children, these being Madison and John Morris. I met both at Grandfather's near Walla Walla, Washington, in 1865. (Note: When Nicholas was four years old.) Madison became an early-day physician and practiced his profession in the Walla Walla country.

Hannah Estes married a Mr. Hastings.. They were the parents of five sons of whom I can speak, and may have had other children. The five I know of were, in rotation: Francis, Archibald, Burris, John, and James. The three, Archibald, Burris, and John, came to Oregon with my parents in 1853, when Archibald was twenty-four years old, Burris twenty-two, and John twenty, and settled in Polk County, Oregon, living there the remainder of their lives. Archibald never married, but Burris and John married and raised families.

Grandfather and family moved from Tennessee to Fulton County, Arkansas some time during the year of 1839. At about the same time the John Estes, Morris, and Hastings families moved to the same place. My Estes grandparents, with their children and a number of relatives near them lived in Arkansas approximately twenty years. Here Grandfather owned a farm and was also a blacksmith and gunsmith, having considerable mechanical ability. He lost the sight of an eye when a small piece of steel or iron struck the eye while blacksmithing. I do not know if this happened in Tennessee or in Arkansas.

I am not informed as to the extent of his farm, but know that he raised a great deal to timber. The woods near Grandfather's home abounded with much wild game, affording great sport for those who liked to hunt. There were bear, deer, panther, wild turkeys, and many other such to lure the sportsman.

People gathered hickory nuts, black walnuts, papaws, and other eatables native to the country. They manufactured soap from wood ashes and fats, spun, wove, and made almost all their clothing. Biscuit bread or corn cakes were made every day, as bread kept any length of time would mold. Quilting bees were often held, and corn-shuckings were hailed with delight every fall by both whites and slaves.

Church services were held in the nearby schoolhouse, and my grandparents were regular attendants, as they were strict Baptists. The colored people held separate religious meetings during which they would loudly sing and shout, though it may be said that some would steal a chicken occasionally to heighten a festive repast of corn pone and possum.

Sarah (Sallie) Estes, Grandfather's oldest daughter, married Hugh Faulkingbury (Falkinbury) in 1841, or when she was sixteen years of age. By him she had five children, all born in Arkansas. These were Martha, born early in 1842, then came Susan, David, Thomas, and John. The whole family arrived in Oregon with my parents in 1853, except Mr. Falkinbury, who died on the plains. Sometime after coming to Oregon, Aunt Sallie married William Sebring, a widower with five children, three of whom were almost grown. He had previously buried two wives. He owned a large farm adjoining the one my father bought, near the present site of Airlie, in 1860, Polk County, Oregon. On this farm Aunt Sallie had five Sebring children. In rotation they were: Andrew, George, James, Emily, and Marcus. They lived on this farm till buying a farm seven miles from Roseburg. While here Aunt Sallie concluded to leave Mr. Sebring, saying that she could not bear his abusive and tyrannical treatment any longer. So she came back to Polk County, Oregon, in 1872 or 1873. Later Mr. Sebring offered to allow her to keep the young children and giver her $800 as a settlement. This she accepted, but they were never divorced. Mr. Sebring remained in Roseburg with his oldest son, Francis, till his death.

After the separation, Aunt Sallie lived in several places in Polk County, always having some of her children about her. She was living in Airlie, occupying her own home when she died, in the year 1906, at the age of eighty-one. She was buried in the English cemetery near Airlie. Two of her sons, David and Thomas, died when they were young men, with tuberculosis, but Martha, Susan and John lived to be more than eighty years of age. Marcus is the only one remaining of her children at this date, September 25, 1939.

Mary Estes, Grandfather's fourth child, was born March 23, 1827, and was living with her parents when she married Hardy Long, on July 4, 1844. The Long family came to California in 1852 and lived on a farm about twelve miles north of Chico. Mr. Long died on this farm March 15, 1865, when his oldest son was seventeen years old. It seems that this son, Nimrod, with the consent of his mother, took charge of his father's affairs and acted as father in the family for many years. Disposing of the California property, the family came to Polk County, Oregon, in the summer of 1877, and was domiciled a few months near the Robert Tarter home. All the family then living were then there, except Frank, who had previously come to Oregon and had worked for my Father, Robert Tarter, for more than a year before returning to California.

During that summer, Nimrod Long went to Eastern Oregon to look for a suitable location on which the family could settle. He found such a place Near Heppner, Oregon, where the family located in the late summer or fall of 1877. After dwelling there a few years, Nimrod married, and he and Aunt Mary divided the property, Nimrod with his family going to Ashland, Oregon. Later Aunt Mary and several of her children lived in Southern Oregon. She passed away at the home of her daughter, Susan E. Brown, in Josephine County, Oregon, on August 13, 1898, and is buried near Williams Creek, the cemetery being on the Gotcher place, about seventeen miles from Grants Pass.

Aunt Mary's children are (in rotation) as follows: Lucinda, Nimrod, Frank, Thomas, Hardy, Rebecca, Evisa, Marion, and Susan. Lucinda and Evisa died when they were quite young.

I will now speak of my mother, Susan Abigail Estes, who was born in Henry County, Tennessee, on April 7, 1829. When ten years of age, she moved with her father's family to Fulton County, Arkansas during the year 1839. She lived there with her father until she married my father on June 12, 1846, this date being the thirty-second anniversary of Father's birth. Father left his home in Wythe County, Virginia, before he was of age, and later served an apprenticeship as brick mason. He also, by his own efforts, became ac carpenter. He had worked at these trades in several states before he drifted into Arkansas, where he met Mother the first time.

After their marriage, Father continued working at his trade, and among other jobs accomplished built the court house in Searcy County, Arkansas.

In 1849, Father, with a few other men, started with pack horses to the gold mines of California, traveling the old Santa Fe Trail. (The group would most likely have included James Madison Estes and his brother Burris, Hardy Long, Hugh Fulkenbury and Archibald Burris Estes.) In the fields Father was quite prosperous for a time, or until he became ill with scurvy. Continuing to be ill, and growing very weak, he was advised to home lest he lose his life. Consequently, he boarded a sailing vessel at San Francisco bound for the Isthmus of Panama. The vessel ran into a calm in the Tropics and was delayed a long time. For a period of forty days Father did not see land. Crossing the Isthmus, he took passage on a vessel bound for home, coming through the Gulf of Mexico, and up the Mississippi River to the landing place nearest home.

He was gone approximately two years, during which time Mother remained at her father's home. Their oldest child, Virginia Ann, was born on March 8, 1852, in Fulton County, Arkansas. The next year, 1853, they came, with a few other families, to Oregon. These were John Estes, the Fulkinburys, Lana (Simpson) Woods, and Green Simpson families; also Archibald, Burris, and John Hastings. I do not know of the others, nor the name of their captain. Those whom I have named came to Polk County.

After arriving in Polk County, Oregon, my parents lived a short time in Eola, Father working there and at Salem. Next they were domiciled on the hill west of the McTimmonds Valley, also in Polk County, Oregon. While here, Father built the large barn for the McTimmonds, the framework being hand-hewed from fairly large fir trees.

Father here was on the alert to find some vacant land on which he could permanently locate. About two miles easterly from the present site at Airlie, he found some vacant land and bought what then was called a "squatter's rights" to more land. From these two pieces of land or parts of each, my parents moved up on a half-section known and recorded as "The Robert Tarter and Susan A. Tarter Donation Land Claim." To the best of my knowledge, they located on this claim some time in the year 1854. While they were on this claim a son, Daniel (who was born, as I think, on the hill west of McTimmons Valley) died, and two sons; namely, Nicholas and Robert, were born.

In May, 1859, my parents sold their D.L.C. to David Stump and started to Klickitat Valley, which had been heralded as a region of fine land and unlimited stock range. Accompanying them were their neighbors, the Parrot family, and a Mr. Golden with his young wife, who was one of the Parrot daughters. This Mr. Golden later founded Goldendale in Klickitat Valley. They arrived in Klickitat some time in August, 1859, and located on claims near one another.

My parents claim was near what is called "The Swale," which flowed into a lake at that time but which was drained later. The house stood near the lake, which was about half-a-mile long and perhaps a hundred yards wide. Father had taken with him thirteen cows and heifers, expecting them to grow into a large herd as time went by. Here my brother, Henry, was born on March 4, 1860. There was so much snow, and the winter of 1859-1860 so cold that they concluded to leave the valley. They sold their belongings to Ben Snipes and thought of going to the Rogue River Valley, Oregon. They arrived at the Rice W. Simpson place in Polk County, Oregon, in early June 1860, and camped for a spell. While camping here they bought the M. W. Bevens farm of four hundred acres, adjoining the Simpson Farm and less than a mile from the present site of Airlie, Polk County, Oregon.

They moved to this farm in June 1860. In the year 1864, Father bought an adjoining farm of one hundred eighty-one acres from P. M. Collins, and another adjoining eighty acres from John Hyde at about the same time. This made up the farm of six hundred sixty-one acres on which my parents lived until the time of their death.

It was here that Beuregard (Bura), Sarah Emily, Laura Mary, and Frances Belle Tarter were born. Here the Tarter children learned to do the chores and tasks necessary at the homes of the early pioneers of Oregon.

Father raised a few horses, many hogs, and dealt in buying and selling cattle for several years. With some hired help and the assistance of his sons, after they became old enough to work in the field, he yearly produced a large acreage of grain. During this time Mother raised chickens, turkeys, geese and ducks - besides caring for her children and making most of their clothes. For several years Father, with the help of his children, gathered and prepared for drying the apples from his twenty-acre orchard, selling each fall from 3000 to 5000 pounds of dried fruit.

From the time my parents arrived in Oregon in 1853, till the middle of the summer of 1868, Father built the first five bridges that spanned the Luckiamute River in Polk County, Oregon, between the R. W. Simpson D. L. C. and the mouth of the river. He built the first one at the Simpson place before I can remember, and perhaps before I was born, and built the second one at the Simpson Place in 1868. During this time he also built many barns and chimneys for the early pioneers.

During the summer of 1868, he also burned a kiln of brick on his farm and erected a new house, which is still standing and in a good state of preservation. He kiln-dried and hand -dressed the lumber. The chimneys and foundation pillars are of the brick he made that summer.

Father, as I have stated elsewhere, was six feet tall, very muscular, with no surplus flesh, weighed an average of a hundred seventy-five pounds, had brown hair and blue eyes, and was a man of great energy and endurance.

Mother was five feet four inches tall, had brown hair, blue eyes, and weighed an average of from a hundred thirty-five to hundred forty pounds. She was very industrious, and it is my opinion that she did as much work, according to her strength, as Father did. She, with Father, joined the Baptist church in Arkansas. After arriving in Oregon Mother joined the Southern Methodist church, as it was the only one near our home, but Father did not take membership in any church.

Father died on November 8, 1883. Mother passed away on June 19, 1886. The remains of both rest in the English Cemetery (South of Mammoth. The English Cemetery was moved from Camp Adair area in the early 1940s - World War II period.) near Airlie, Polk County, Oregon. Their children's births and deaths follow:

Grandfather's first two children, Burris and James, went with their father's family to Arkansas and lived there the remainder of their lives. I suppose they raised families but am not certain of this. These two were living when my parents started to Oregon. They both died before they became old men, and I have wondered if either or both were living when Grandfather started west. (They were both alive, James died in 1863 and Burris in 1865, both in their forties.)

In the year 1861, (it was actually 1860.) Grandfather, with his immediate family and several families of his sons-in-law and others, moved from Arkansas to the Walla Walla country in Washington Territory. A daughter, Hannah Estes Cope, remained in Arkansas the remainder of her life. I know very little about her and nothing about her children.

When my parents and family lived, temporarily, in the vicinity of Walla Walla, Washington, during the winter of 1865-66, Grandfather and family were living on Dry Creek, about six miles from the town of Walla Walla. About a mile below there lived Uncle Thomas Estes and his young wife. Next below lived Uncle Tipton Wiseman and family, and below this lived Uncle David King and family. On a small stream called Spring Creek, which flows into Dry Creek, there lived Uncle Dudley Kinchelow. These farms all were consecutive except that the Zaring farm lay between Grandfather's farm and Uncle Thomas Estes' farm.

Cade Cope, who married Ann Malone Estes, also came to the Walla Walla country, in 1861; lived there a year or two, then came to Oregon with his family and was for a short time on my father's place. Later the family acquired a small farm about two miles below Buena Vista, in Polk County, Oregon. Mr. Cope died of tuberculosis after spending a few years here - in 1869. When property affairs were settled, Aunt Ann, with her family, moved to the vicinity of Walla Walla to be near her parents and other relatives. She died before she became an old lady, and is buried in a private cemetery near the road on Dry Creek, between Grandfather's old farm and the Thomas Paul farm. Several other relatives also are buried in this cemetery.

Aunt Ann's children, who I well remember, are: Amanda, who married Isaac Paul: William (Bud); Rebecca; and Octavia. Two of her children died while quite young while she was living in Oregon. The whole family has now passed on.

Martha Elizabeth Estes (Aunt Lizzie) married a Mr. Johnson, by whom she had two sons, James and Marshal. She divorced Mr. Johnson and married David King when her two boys were young children. Theses two sons lived in the vicinity of Walla Walla during their lives and died before they passed middle age. As I recall, she had three King children - one son and two daughters.

Several years before she reached middle life, she became afflicted with a mental disturbance and for many years she was kept in the State Hospital at Salem, Oregon, but her last years were spent in a sanitarium in Portland, Oregon. She lived to be an old lady, and her remains were buried in a cemetery in Portland. Her maintenance while in the sanitarium and her funeral expenses were paid by her son, Will R. King.

The children of Uncle David and Aunt Lizzie King were: William Rufus (Will R.); Laura; and Sadie.

Will R. King became a very outstanding man. He was born on Dry Creek October 3, 1864. In the early 1870's his father disposed of the farm near Walla Walla and acquired another farm in what is now Malheaur County, Oregon. Here young King attended district schools, found in that sparsely settled part of the State. He learned the varied duties of the old-time farmer's boy, and for several winters attended public schools in Weston, Oregon - three hundred miles from home. After completing his public school education, he attended Oregon State College for three years (1882-1885). During the next four years he was in charge of his father's farm, and then entered the law department of the Central Normal College at Danville, Indiana. He graduated in Law with the degree LL.B in 1891, and began practice in 1892, at Vale, Oregon. In the following year he moved to Baker, Oregon, where he established an enviable reputation as a lawyer.

His official and political career began in 1892, when he was elected on the Democratic ticket to represent Malheur County in the lower branch of the Oregon legislature. Two years later he was elected to a fourth term as State Senator for the district including Baker and Malheur Countries. In 1898, he became the nominee of his party for Governor of Oregon, but was defeated by a moderate plurality.

After his gubernatorial campaign, Judge King devoted himself almost exclusively to professional practice, rapidly extending his reputation as a lawyer throughout the states of Oregon, Idaho, and Washington. As a result, he was appointed Commissioner of the Supreme Court of Oregon. Two years later he became Associate Justice of that court, which office he held until January 1, 1911. Upon his retirement from the Supreme Bench, he resumed the practice of law, with offices at Portland, Oregon. While on the Supreme Bench, Judge King wrote opinions in many important cases which are regarded as models of lucid statement and sound reasoning.

When President Wilson made up his cabinet, he chose Hon. Franklin M. Lane as Secretary of the Interior, and he proceeded at once to put the Reclamation Service on a substantial and much improved basis. In recognition of his profound knowledge of this work, Judge King was selected Chief Counsel. This appointment was made on May 6, 1913. As Chief Counsel of the Reclamation Service, Judge King was head of the Legal Division, and had under his general supervision the work for the service of the many counsel employed therein. He held this office till the close of the Wilson administration.

Judge King was married to Lizzie Myrtle King (not a relative) of Danville, Indiana, on December 6, 1892. They have one son, Eldon P. King, a lawyer of Washington, D. C., and one daughter, Myrtle, who is teaching in Hawaii.

Judge King died in 1934, in Washington, D. C., at the approximate age of seventy years, and the remains are buried in Arlington Cemetery. His wife still lives, but I am not informed as to where she is at the present time.

This information regarding Will R. King is taken largely from a biographical sketch copied from the Encyclopedia of American Biography.

Thomas W. Estes, Grandfather's third son, and first son by his second wife, was born in Arkansas and grew to manhood there. When twenty years of age, or in 1860, he came to California and made his home with his brother-in-law and half-sister, Hardy and Mary Long, for a period of almost two years. In 1862, he came to Oregon and visited his half-sister, Susan Tarter and family; also he visited his Aunt Nancy Estes, widow of his Uncle John Estes, and family. During this time he found great pleasure in associating with his cousin, Joseph Estes, who he had known in his boyhood days in Arkansas. In 1863, he went to Walla Walla County, Washington, and acquired a farm about a mile below that of his father. While here he met Louisa Paul, whom he married in 1865. To this union was born a large family - eleven children - of who I will speak later.

After living on Dry Creek a number of years, they became owners of a large farm on Eureka Flat, where they dwelt a few years, after which they moved to Polk County, Oregon. Here they lived a number of years, Mr. Estes operating a grocery store for a time.

Mr. and Mrs. Estes, whom I knew affectionately as Uncle Tom and Aunt Louisa, lived in Seattle, Washington, during the last years, where their remains are buried. Uncle Tom was not quite eighty years at the time of his death, and Aunt Louisa was past eighty when she passed away.

The children, in rotation are: Joseph Edwin; Clara Augusta; Jennie Elizabeth; Ida Irene; William Newton; Alta Maude; Claude Wesley; Eva Lillian; Mabel Vivian; Orville Burris; and Otho Paul. The first three died within a few days of one another, from diphtheria. Eva and Mabel were twins, and both died in infancy, as did Orville.

The five living are as follows: Ida of Seattle, William of Seattle, Alta of Vancouver, B. C., Claude of Seattle, and Otho of San Francisco. Ida is now Mrs. Avery, and Alta is Mrs. Swartz.

Nancy Emeline Estes, Grandfather's fourth daughter by his second wife, was born in Arkansas and grew to womanhood there. She married Tipton Wiseman and in a very short time afterward came west to Walla Walla County, Washington where they acquired a farm on Dry Creek and lived there a number of years. Later they sold this farm and obtained a large farm on Eureka Flat. Here, with the assistance of their sons, they did extensive farming for several years. In their elderly years they retired from the farm and lived in the city of Walla Walla the remainder of their lives.

Their children, in rotation, are as follows: William, Jefferson, Josephine (Wiseman) Abbott, Charlie, Frances (Wiseman) Cope, Mary (Wiseman) Harvey, Dollie (Wiseman) Smails. (Should be Porter, not Smails.)

Delila Estes, Grandfather's fifth daughter by his second wife, was born in and raised in Arkansas. She married Dudley Kinchelow, and with her family came with her father's people to Walla Walla County, Washington, in 1861 (1860), and settled in the Dry Creek valley. She and her husband both died in 1868, leaving three children; namely, Sarah, James and Rufus.

John R. Estes, Grandfather's second son by his second wife, was born in Arkansas and came with his parents to the Walla Walla country when he was thirteen years of age. Here he grew to manhood and later acquired a farm on Eureka Flat. He operated this farm for several years. He remained a bachelor and died when he was thirty-for years of age.

William M. Estes, Grandfather's third son by his second wife, was born in Arkansas and came to Walla Walla County, Washington, when he was eleven years of age. He grew to majority while on his father's farm. Early in life he went to Arkansas, married there, kept store for a short time, and then returned with his wife to his father's home. Shortly thereafter he became ill, as did his wife. He soon passed away. The day after his death, his wife died, and both were buried at the same time in the private cemetery on Dry Creek, Walla Walla County.

Irania E. Estes, Grandfather's sixth daughter by his second wife, was born in Arkansas, came west with her parents when she was nine years of age, and lived at her parents' home until she married Mr. Frank Gibbons, when she was approximately sixteen. She spent most of her life in the territory and state of Washington, where she raised a large family, almost all of whom were daughters. She died when in her early seventies.

Hugh P. Estes, Grandfather's fourth son by his second wife, was born in Arkansas, and came with his parents to the Walla Walla country when he was seven years of age, living with them till he was in his late "teen," when he came to Oregon and made his home with my parents, Robert and Susan Tarter, for several years. During this time he worked for a number of farmers and a great deal for my father. He became well acquainted in the neighborhood and was well liked by all, especially by the younger folk.

Later he returned to Walla Walla, where he acquired a farm on Eureka Flat, married a Miss Woods, and was a successful farmer for a number of years. He passed away in his early seventies, leaving, as I am informed the following named children: Myrtle, Mabel, Hazel, and Lloyd Estes.

Lycurgus Winchester Estes, Grandfather's fifth son by his second marriage, was born in Arkansas and was brought to the home on Dry Creek when he was three years of age, and here grew to manhood. He married Miss Woods, became owner of a large tract on Eureka Flat, and was a very successful farmer. He passed away when he was almost seventy-eight years of age, leaving a wife and the following children that I know of: Clyde, Roxy and Sylvia Estes.

Cader Tipton Estes, Grandfather's sixth son by his second marriage, arrived in the Walla Walla country with his parents when he was approximately two years of age. He grew to manhood on his father' Dry Creek farm. After becoming of age, he farmed for several years on Eureka Flat, and later became a painter and paper-hanger. For a number of years he has worked in the city of Walla Walla. He is married and has the following children: Fred, Jesse, Elsie, and Marjory.

Sidney J. Estes, Grandfather's seventh son by his second wife, was born at his father's Dry Creek home in Walla Walla County, Washington. Here he remained till he became a man. He has been employed at various operations during his life, never married, and is now living in the city of Walla Walla.

I have now written of my Estes grandparents' early life, their middle life, and of each of their children. I will now speak of their elderly lives, and as I knew them at their home on Dry Creek, Walla Walla, when my parents were sojourning nearby in the fall of 1865 and the spring of 1866. As I have already indicated, they moved to the above mentioned location in the fall of 1861 (1860) and acquired their Dry Creek property.

The valley of Dry Creek is about twenty-five miles long, more or less, and on an average one-half-mile wide, being wider in some places and narrower in others. It is intersected by Dry Creek, which flows into Walla Walla River, and skirted on both sides by low rolling hills, covered with bunch grass, and which were the habitat of numerous flocks of prairie chickens that lived there all year except during snow, when these birds would come to the valley, feed about the hay stacks, and eat buds and berries from the small trees and brush that lined the creek for a few yards on either side.

Grandfather's farm reached the entire width of the valley and a short distance on the upland of the side nearest Walla Walla. The large log dwelling was built on the above mentioned side at the edge of the valley and on a very gentle incline. The house consisted of three rooms. There was a large sitting room, and bedroom combined, with fireplace, and a kitchen which also served as dining room - downstairs. The whole upstairs was one large bedroom. There was a well of water about twenty feet from the kitchen. It supplied plenty of water for home use and was not overly deep, as it was at the edge of the valley.

Horses and cattle subsisted on bunch grass most of the year, it being good feed after it dried in the fall, but they had to be brought to the hay stacks when snow covered the ground.

The greater part of Grandfather's valley land produced a different kind of native grass that grew tall and made fine hay. I remember of his having long stacks of hay in the fall of 1865. While serving for feeding during the winter, much of it was sold in the town of Walla Walla. I remember of Grandpa taking loads of it to town on hayrack and wagon drawn by a yoke of oxen. Although his hair and beard were white, and he was sixty-six years of age, he was as alert, straight, and had the endurance of men much younger. He walked beside the oxen, driving them six miles to Walla Walla, sold the hay, and drove the oxen home - riding on the rack on the return.

While the rolling prairies, consisting of thousands of acres, were vacant and free for anyone to use for grazing, the valley lands owned by homesteaders had to be inclosed to preserve the crops. Fences were made by digging ditches about two-and-a-half feet wide at the surface, two feet deep, and sloping down so the bottom was bout eighteen inches side. The sod at the surface was cut into squares convenient for handling, and stacked along the top inner edge of the ditch, making a wall with turf next to the ditch. The dirt was thrown over and against the wall, stakes were set along the tip, and slender poles were fastened to them, making an adequate fence.

About a mile-and-a-half below Grandfather's house, and on the same edge of the valley, was a school house in which school was kept and church services were held. Christian ministers, or Campbell's ministers as we then called them, established a class there. As there was no Baptist church near, Grandpa and Grandma joined this church.

Here my grandparents, with their younger children, lived happily for approximately twenty years. There were seven children at home in 1866. John, the oldest, was eighteen years of age and Sidney, the youngest, who was born on Dry Creek, was four years old.

Late in the 1870's or early in the 1880's two of Grandfather's sons went to Eureka Flat in the spring of the year, broke some soil, and planted garden seeds. Returning in the fall, they found the plantings had grown and matured beyond expectation. Not long after this my grandparents disposed of their farm on Dry Creek and with several sons and the Tip Wiseman family acquired farms on this flat.

Eureka Flat, about thirty miles from Dry Creek, contains thousands of acres of comparatively level land and is a very elevated section of the country. On account of its elevation and distance from water, it had previously been considered unfit for cultivation, but proved to be one of the finest wheat sections of the state. The rent of Grandfather's farm was sufficient to amply provide far all the family needs.

About this time it was learned that the rolling hills of eastern Washington were excellent wheat land. Consequently there was a great rush for this great expanse of vacant land, although the sides of some of the hills were quite steep for harvesting. It is marvelous that the number of farms in Washington in the year of 1920 was ten times the number in 1880. The price of land increased rapidly, and farms on Eureka Flat soon became valuable.

My mother, Mrs. Susan Tarter, and her sister, Mrs. Sarah Sebring, visited their father and stepmother in the 1884. In order to provide them with a chicken dinner, Grandfather took his rifle (and) shot off a chicken's head to show them what he could do. He had not seen these daughters for years.

While seemingly about as well as usual, Grandfather had a stroke or heart attack, dying suddenly at the home of his son, Tipton, on August 18, 1886. (This is not entirely correct, since his will was dated August 17, 1886.) He was almost eighty-seven years of age and had lived a long, active, and upright life. His remains rest in the cemetery on Eureka Flat, Washington.

Grandma Estes' maiden name, as I have already indicated, was Irania Malone, and she claimed to be of Scotch-Irish descent. She became the stepmother of five children when she married at the age of sixteen years. Although so young, she strove patiently and with fortitude to do as well by them as she did by her own thirteen that came afterward. She shared with her husband in the pleasures and trials of raising a large family. She died November 15, 1888, and her remains are buried by those of her husband on Eureka Flat.

Thomas Estes was largely of English descent. He was born in North Carolina, November 11, 1799, and died in Wall Walla County, Washington, August 18, 1886.

Irania Malone Estes was of Scotch-Irish descent and was born in Tennessee April 24, 1817. She died in Walla Walla County, Washington, November 15, 1888.

In writing the foregoing historical sketch of the Estes family or clan, I have been very careful not to make any statement that I did not know to be true, or strongly believed to be true, from the best information obtainable. Those in whose hands this sketch may fall may extend it as time goes by, at their pleasure.

1 As told by Mrs. Mary Elizabeth Munkers Estes (1836 – 1916 Ore.?) to Mary E. Watson while sitting by her fireside, Christmas Eve, 1916. Elizabeth is the second wife of John Estes (1827 Me.- 18?? Ore., relation to our branch unknown), and the daughter of Benjamin Munkers and Mary Elizabeth Crowley. Reprinted in Martha Alice (Turnidge) Hamot, The Trail Blazers, (1935: Portland Metropolitan Publishing Co., Portland, Oregon); and, David Klausmeyer, Oregon Trail Stories: True Accounts of Life in a Covered Wagon (2003: The Globe Pequot Press), at 39-43. Descendant Opal L. Munkers Guerin, daughter of Benjamin’s son Thomas Jefferson Munkers, later became a member of the Daughters of the Pioneers of Washington, Seattle Chapter. See, DPW Reference Index, Volume 2 E-M (Tacoma, Wash. 1962), Seattle Public Library, R929 D 26591R.

2 Works Projects Administration Historical Records Survey, Benton County, Oregon, Mark Phinney, Interviews -- H Part 2, Oregon State Library, Salem, Oregon. www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~orbenton/wpa/IntervH2.html

3 Sunday Arkansas Gazette, 6 June 1943, Reprinted in The Izard County Historian, Volume 7, No. 4, October 1976 (Melbourne, Ark.); and in Estes, Descendants of Archibald Burris Estes, Note 76).