A Diary of My Younger Years - The Autobiography of Ivan Hall

Randolph Goes to Arkansas

THE END OF THE DROUTH

September 15, 1893

A glorious rain fell today; it had not rained for more than two months -- the longest drouth ever known in this part of the country. The cotton crop around here is almost ruined, though what little there is will soon be ready for picking. Sam is just getting over his spell of typhoid fever; he had quite a time of it. None of us thought he would ever get well; he had fever for more than two months. Nearly every one of us has been sick with the chills.

Just across the Mississippi River in Arkansas lie the great swamps, extending clear across the state from north to south, for seventy-five miles west from the river into the state. This country is sickly and very thinly inhabited. However, several counties in the northwest corner of Arkansas lie in the Ozark mountains, where it is rocky and hilly. That part of Arkansas is very high and healthful and full of good springs. Although the land there is said to be not as rich as it is here, it contains many fine apple orchards. The part of Arkansas that lies in the Ozark Mountains is called the Big Red Apple.

September 29, 1893

We are picking our cotton crop, though we will not have nearly as much cotton as we might have had, had it not been for the drouth. My oldest brother is preparing to go to Northwestern Arkansas in the county of Benton. He will go on the cars from Memphis to Van Buren, near Fort Smith, by Little Rock, then from Van Buren directly to Bentonville, where we have some relatives. After he gets there, if he likes the country very well, he will write home and we will go too. But if he does not like it he will return home.

RANDOLPH GOES TO ARKANSAS

October 2, 1893

It is just pouring down rain today. The gulleys are full, and the creeks are rising very fast! Such rains! It brings back to remembrance the great rains and floods of last winter and spring, when the backwater flooded all the vast swamps. Shower after shower comes and goes. I thought what a fine crop we would have had if the rains had only come sooner, as they generally do. But this is the greatest drouth summer ever known to come to this country. We had been picking cotton until it commenced to rain. Now it looks as if it was going to be picked by the heavy showers, and I don't care much, for I am getting tired of picking cotton. Indeed, I have been having the chills for two weeks and I am not feeling good at all. I have been taking quinine until everything tastes like quinine, and my head roars like a bass drum.

My eldest brother Randolph has left home to go to Benton County, Arkansas today. My father accompanied him as far as Memphis.

October 4, 1893

The rain has ceased and everybody is picking out his cotton. The cotton gins are busily engaged in ginning cotton at Millington, Cuba, and our little village of Shake Rag. We received a note from Randolph; he was at Van Buren, Arkansas.

October 6, 1893

It rained again today, and we have heard from Randolph that he is in Benton County, Arkansas. He likes the country. He writes for us to come there too as soon as we can. We are determined to leave the chills and fevers infesting this region and move to the same place as Randolph.

October 14, 1893

We are preparing to move to Benton County, Arkansas. Have gathered and sold all our crops. I cut my name in some shading beech trees to let it remain as a last memento of the time I lived here. Farewell to the land of cotton and cypress swamps. Farewell to West Union, Tennessee, with all its pleasures and sorrows. It is not without some regret that I say goodbye to Tennessee.

GOOD NIGHT, DEAR LAND

May the sparkling dewdrops shine across thy path.

May the brightest sunbeams around thee ever stray.

May all be peace and gladness, as you pass through every day;

Then with the setting sun, good night, my dear land, I say.