Pages That Mention Nashville, Tennessee
Letter from Green Clay to Sally Clay, 8 January 1820
Page 2
I have hired a man to go with Jeff tomorrow morning, in serch of the horses: Jeffs horse was hobbled with a rope: but if there should be any whiskey in the way, & I am informed there is, they will end their Journey there I expect: I must start one or 2 more men out after the horses: tomorrow or next day.
When I left home I took bearly money enough to bear my Expences, & my expences here are greatly more than I expected. Corn is 4 lb. per bushel, and in Some places one Dollar. The man Overby Sold my Whiskey to, is insolvent, I cant git one Dollar from him: his note is for $221. the greatest plenty if I could git it, to buy me two ponies to take me home. my great coat lieing in the woods, is burnt in holes: the brush and greenbriers with which this county abounds, has tore my Socks, Legings, Breeches, & Great Coat into strings or rather Rags: here for the first time for many years past, I have Dined & Sup'd on Dry bread and swamp water, I am compeled to wash down [hand?] mill [bead?], with water, I have fellen off 30. or 40. pounds I expect, with observation and the bowell complaint, my fat belley has gone down. I am now as gaunt as Brutus almost.
The Indians are encamped all through this County. I am at their camp almost every day, but they are like the Bees that assembled at Nashvill Some years ago. Quite harmeless to all appearance. They live wandering about seeking Game: and realy git more of it, and live better than half the whites: in this quarter when Jeff has whiskey he is all noise & bustle: when none he mopes about and dose but little: he is the [mer?] [iest?] Spencer: That I ever saw: I had better been by myself if I am in verry good health most of my time, and all my complaints are the effects of fateague cold and hunger. You must not send me any money in Bank Bills by the mail for I shall be gone hence before it would arrive here. The hogs in this country are all caught or shot in the woods & killed as they run no such thing as puting up hogs to fatten with corn, the [me?] eats like boar meet strong & tuff: like all other wild meet nothing like our corn feed [?]: bad enough