(TEXAS) Letter describing the construction of an Indian trad

Sale 2517 - Lot 216

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"KNOCKING ABOUT & ROUGHING IT IN TEXAS " (TEXAS.) Letter describing the construction of an Indian trading post on the western frontier. Manuscript letter (unsigned) to wife Jessie Stens(?) of Seguin, TX. 3 pages, 10 3/4 x 8 1/4 inches, on one folding sheet with address panel on final blank with manuscript cancel "Waco Village, Texas"; minor foxing and wear including seal tear in text area. With typed transcript. Camp on Steele's Creek near Fort Graham, TX, 10 December 1851

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A letter from an unidentified Indian trader on the frontier near Waco and Fort Graham: "I am here in my camp, or house, situated in a very pretty valley in Steele's Creek about six miles from Fort Graham. . . . Last night for the first time I have slept in my house. I have been looking on and helping fix up, chunking up the cracks and making it tight and hurrying them along so that I may be prepared for the next 'norther.' . . . The dry grass that covers the floor caught fire & woke me up with a blaze all around & underneath me. Hoze & I soon put it out, but it burned one of my blankets. . . . I intend fixing off a part of the room & making a Texas carpet, laying down dry grass & covering it with sheeting." Awaiting the arrival of a wagon with trade goods, he notes that "the Indians have not yet assembled. . . . As I have gone to the expense of putting up these rooms, should it prove to be a good place to meet the Indians, I may continue this place as a point of meeting & communicating with the Indians for some time." The author debates placing his wife in safer quarters at nearby Fort Graham, but adds "I could fix up two rooms & a kitchen of logs so easily, I find, that I should be tempted to do so at once, whenever you & I can fix on the spot. I begin to think that knocking about & roughing it in Texas may after a while improve my health very much."