Edmund Booth: Deaf Pioneer

8 Home Again

EIGHT Home Again O} EDMUND Booth finally started for home some time in February 1854. He traveled to San Francisco by stage, waited with friends a few days until a steamer sailed, and then spent twelve days at sea. The California and Oregon Trails were still largely one-way routes westward, so the most popular and quickest way home was through Nicaragua and across the Gulf of Mexico. With about 500 other passengers, Edmund took a steamer to the foot of Lake Nicaragua, transferred on to one sternwheeler, and then another, which entered the San Juan River. He journeyed by mule across land to the Caribbean, taking note of the tropical vegetation and many curiosities on the way. After reaching the fort on the Caribbean side of Nicaragua Edmund boarded a large boat, but a gale at the western extremity of Cuba delayed his departure. After the storm abated, the ship turned northwestward and headed for the mouth of the Mississippi. His destination yet a long way off, Edmund went to his bunk. During this voyage home Edmund read many newspaper reports about the growing strife between the North and South. His displeasure with slavery was so intense that he could never hold back his anger: “I told a couple of southern men of my California acquaintance that if the south wished to go out of the Union, to go and be hanged. They laughed but showed no anger. Told them I was tired of this strife and constant threats and complaints.”1 As in California, people on the ship readily made acquaintances. “Good nature prevailed,” he wrote; “we were all going home.” Upon reaching New Orleans, the crowds scattered, those bound north walked along the long line of river steamers and consulted newspaper advertisements for 107 108 Edmund Booth: Deaf Pioneer dates of departure for St. Louis. Edmund found a boat scheduled to leave at 2:00 in the afternoon, and he paid $20 for a stateroom, board, and passage. There were repeated delays over the next three days, which Edmund surmised were caused by the desire “to procure more passengers and freight.” Finally, on the fourth day, “the boat drew out and started up stream.”2 The trip was a pleasant one until the boat ran aground below St. Louis, because it was too heavily loaded. A passenger boat following a mile behind was signaled, came alongside, and took off some passengers at $4 a head. Edmund was one of those passengers. I went with them for there was no knowing when the water would rise or the boat be got off by lightening cargo. I reached St. Louis, and here I wished I had stayed in California another month. The river above was closed by ice and only one steamer was advertised to try to break through the next day for Davenport, Iowa. It was in the closing days of February. I took passage on that one steamer. It was easy enough for the first few miles. After that it was rushing the boat and cutting away some rods, backing out and rushing in again, until about three or four miles below Keokuk, Iowa. There the contest was given up and we came to land. A dozen of us went ashore, kindled a fire for comfort while two men went inland on the hunt for a team to take the party forward to town. This came after some time and we all packed into the two horse wagon and reached Keokuk and the hotel in the course of the night. Next day took conveyance to Burlington and thence by stagecoach for Iowa City. . . . Next morning I took stage for Anamosa via Cedar Rapids, then a small straggling village. . . . this time sat outside with the driver, wishing to get a good view of the country while approaching home.3 In March 1854 there was not a mile of railroad or a telegraph line in the state of Iowa at the time. The Booth family had been anticipating Edmund’s arrival, but they had no way of knowing exactly when he would be home. They knew it was a slow journey from California, and the last leg would be on Frink and Walker’s four-horse coach line from Iowa City. Thomas, now twelve years old, kept watch on a log near the family’s woodpile in front of the house. He gazed westward down the military [3.138.200.66] Project MUSE (2024-04-19 20:36 GMT...