Nelson Franklin Smith, LaFayette, Tippecanoe, Indiana to Lucius d Smith, New London, Oneida Co, New York 1843
This country affords all kinds of timber except pine and hemlock. There is black walnut, butternut, hock berry, buckeye, black ash, blue ash, white oak and a great many of them kinds too tedious to mention….. Nelson Franklin Smith, LaFayette, Tippecanoe, Indiana to Lucius d Smith, New London, Oneida Co, New York 1843
Old Smith Letter from IN: Letter 1 OLD LETTER WRITTEN JANUARY 28, 1843 AND POSTMARKED JAN 30
TO: Lucius D. Smith, New London, Oneida Co., NY:
Dear Brother, I received your letter this day and was glad to hear from you and family hoping these few lines will find you all enjoying the same blessings. I never have heard a word from the family since I left Rhode Island. I have been all over the world since I last saw you. I have not wrote a word to any of my connections for the last six years, for I never could get any word from them.
I wish that you would come out and look at this country and see for yourself this is a good country for a laboring man. This country affords all kinds of timber except pine and hemlock. There is black walnut, butternut, hock berry, buckeye, black ash, blue ash, white oak and a great many of them kinds too tedious to mention. You wanted me to inform you length of our canal is finished to the lakes. The distance is two hundred miles from Lafayette.
The canal is going on as far as Terre Haute (IN) which is one hundred miles further down the Wabash River. You write that you are about trading for a piece of land near Danville, IL. But mind or you will be taken in for there is a – of that has no timber on it. It is good land if you can get timber with it. The depth of our canal is about four feet. The locks is 80 feet long, the width is 13 feet. The prospect is that if you had your boats line at this time you could get sale, but there is one building their boats here at this time.
There was three boats come last fall from your canal to this place. There is a great deal of freight here at present. Wheat is 371/2 per bushel- is worth 1 1/2 per hundred, oats is 10 cents, com is 12 1/2 per bushel, flour is 250 per barrel, butter is 8 cents, potatoes is 20 cents, chickens is 6 cents, turkey is 25.
I think that you had better come on here before you fetch your boats. You can come here in six days from where you live. The place where you would get on our canal would be at Toledo (OH) at the head of Lake Erie, three hundred miles from Buffalo (NY). The times is getting better here at present.
My wife and myself send our best respects to you and your wife and son. We have seven children, four boys and three girls. The oldest is 16 years in March. The two boys are big enough to do a man’s work. I have nothing more worth writing at present, so goodbye till I get answer from you. Write as soon as you receive this.
I remain your brother until death, Nelson F. Smith, Lonny (or Lanny)
Children’s names: Dennis Smith, Manda Smith, Nelson Smith, Nancy Smith, Ganny Smith, William Smith, Elizabeth Smith Town-Lafayette Tippecanoe Co. IN
Name: Barbara Pridgen
Notes: this letter was sent to Lucius d Smith in New London, Oneida Co,NY in 1843 from his brother, Nelson Franklin Smith from LaFayette, Tippecanoe, IN, where he and his family homesteaded at a very early dat