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fishing and sporting, hopping, jumping, running and hooping. Hearing so much about those |
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savages in the time of war, I just thought to myself, at that time, if they thought proper at that |
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time, how easy they could have slaughtered us few whites then. But I was not alarmed, nor afraid, |
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for they were peaceable and friendly. They used to fish and hunt, for a number of years after |
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I came here; a few years after that, some two or three years, the white people began to settle in |
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considerably; but in the first place, when I came here, it was a dense wilderness from the head of |
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Conesus lake to Hemlock lake, and on to Naples, and so on. There was not a stick cut in all that |
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distance except what the Indians cut. We went from Conesus to Hemlock valley, now called |
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Springwater, to raise the first house that was built there. That, I think, was in the year of 1805. |
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Then the people began to settle in, the Indians did not like that so well. Just after that, at the end |
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of sugar making, they went through their camps and split up all their troughs, and then fled to their |
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towns on Genesee River, though, after that, they came back to hunt in the fall. It was a great place |
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for game. Sometime after that, we moved from the head of the lake up on the hill about a mile and |
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a half east of the inlet, begun a new place in the woods. The May following, the cattle began to get |
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their living in the woods. . . . My brother-in-law Joseph Allen lived a half a mile off. . . . |
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I recollect another Deer hunt, I went out in the woods one afternoon, just after a rain, the wind |
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blew a considerable gale. I went about half a mile, the first I seen was a large Buck, coming |
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quartering towards me. I blasted out, he whirled about, the sapling timber being so thick I could |
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see nothing but his hip. I fired away and broke his thigh. I loaded my rifle, he went off on three |
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legs with great force. I followed him by the blood for some distance, it was getting towards night, |
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I went home. Next morning, came back with Joseph Allen and two dogs, we went to the place |
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I left him night before, and started out. The dogs, they ran but a short distance till they came upon |
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where he lay behind a log; they ran him about half a mile, and he got behind a dog, and gave |
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battle. He fit [sic] the dogs, and got one of them between his horns up against a log, and |
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stopped and pushed him until I shot him again; we got him down and that finished that hunt. |
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We concluded by ourselves, had we not been there he would have killed both dogs. |
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I have had a great many little frolicks through the woods, with wild game such as Bear and Deer, |
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and other smaller animals, so it went on. In a few years, after people began to settle in |
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considerably, then the wild animals began to decrease a little; so it went on, till bye and bye the |
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1812 war began. General Bradsworth was our commanding officer, Captain Levi Dun was our |
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captain. The were a good many drafts, such a number out of every company. Often times there |
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was a company of Volunteers started, and very often, before they got to the lines, got word to |
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return home again. The last draft that was made in Captain Dun’s company was made in August |
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1814; the war ended in 1815. Then we were not troubled; every man was his own man. Then I |
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began to think I could better myself by getting me a companion. I was almost 30 years of age. |
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On February 23rd, 1816, I got married to Sarah Coller, who was twenty-two years of age. |
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Her father’s name was Thomas Coller, who died October 28th, 1839. He was buried in the |
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Union Society grave yard lying in the S-W part of the town of Conesus; and his wife’s name was |
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Lucerna, who died July 9th, 1848, who was buried in the same graveyard. |
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I made my permanent residence in the town of Conesus, about two miles south of head of the |
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Conesus lake, on the west side of inlet, where I now live, and have ever since I was married. |
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I am the oldest resident [residenter, sic] now living in the town of Conesus. I have lived in this |
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McAninch Family History NL, VIII-4 October 2000 Copyright Frank McAninch page 2000-31 |
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