“Rained all day stayed in camp” again, So my goal for today
was to go turkey hunting, look for a leatherwood bush and then set up and do a quick how to on “baking
bread”. But the railroad gods and Rain have conspired to keep me at home. I don’t
mind sitting in the woods in the rain but I really don’t like sitting in the
rain then having to rush home to then have to work on a train trying to explain
why I smell like wood smoke and looking like a drowned rat before I've even done anything.
The bread idea sprang from talking to a few folks about what food I carry. More often then not in period narratives folks start out a journey carrying flour as a main part of their diet. Soon afterwards the flour is usually "spoilt" and the next 30 entries will be full of the men pointing out they ate meat with "no bread". SO I'll put that up in a day or two but for now I'll leave you with the best 18th century breakfast ever from Samuel Macklay's journal:
TUESDAY, June 22d.—Our supper the Preceeding Day had finished our Bread; we had two Squares of Chocolate left, and a remnant of sugar, Some Bacon; but neither Bread nor flour. We set off & came to our canoe; found her & everything we had left safe. , Semor, one of the hands I had with me, had a little Indian meal which he had left along with our tent and other things. Upon this meal we got to work, made some Dumplings and Boiled them in our Chocolate, and made with the addition of a slice of Bacon, a very hearty Breakfast.
So I
decided I’d kill some time in making a buffalo tumpline aka “hoppus”. A common practice mentioned in a number of
period narratives/trade ledgers is the common use of rawhides in the
construction of cordage. This has been mentioned being used for tyeing up bales
of hides, used in place of rope or even to drag logs.
Dysart:” Killed some buffaloes
split up their skins for to make rope for the purpose of bailing their skins”
There
are a few mentions in the draper interviews of men using buffalo hides as a bag
to store meat and to “hoppus” it back to the station. So with that in mind I
decided to make a Buffalo hide tumpline to see how it’d last over a season of
use. The Bertalino gave me a section of an Old buffalo hide he had laying
around. I soaked the hide overnight and using the basic shape of a tumpline began
to cut it out with my knife. Wish It was more complicated than that but No.
I started the ties from the opposite side of the hide they would meet the brow band and simply increased the width as I went. I also tried to keep the brow band over the thickest part of the hide. Since it started raining shortly after I finished I had to forgo stretching it. I simply hung it up out of the weather to dry. Once dry I will "break" the tumpline by rubbing it back and forth over a tree limb. I was also let with enough hide to use for future projects.
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| Started cutting from the far side increasing the width as I went |
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| tapered to browband and waiting to dry/break |
Raw or moth eaten buffalo hides are usueful for a number of camp fixes such as ropes, moccasin soles or winter mocasins like those mentioned by Daniel Trabue:
"We made socks to go over our shews with buffeloe skins putting the wool inside"
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| Trabue Moc kit and buffalo wool to shove in mocs...just add shoes |
I've included some images of possible leather tumplines being used by southern natives. To date I have not seen an example of a 100% 18th century south eastern native woven tumpline. So for someone doing a southern native impression a leather tumpline might be a good go to.
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Louisiana Indians Walking Along a Bayou Alfred Boisseau – 1847
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| Dupratz |
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| Von Reck |
I'll leave you with this runaway ad since this post is a little less focused on the "refined" clothes/skills. I can really relate to this fellow on his whole Button Problem.
Philadelphia, October 11, 1776.
TWENTY SHILLINGS REWARD.
RUN away, on the night of the 9th instant, an indented English servant boy, named Samuel Tutton, born at Bridgwater, in Somersetshire; about 17 or 18 years of age, 5 feet 2 or 3 inches high, pale face, with a scar on it, a little pitted with the smallpox, has sandy hair; had on an old felt hat, with a bullet hole through it, a short brown coat, with yellow buttons (which makes it singular they being all odd ones) a blue grey waistcoat, much broken at the button holes, a pair of old Russia sheeting trowsers, old white shirt, deep blue yarn stockings, old shoes, with long square steel buckles in them. Whoever apprehends the said servant, and secures him, so that his master may have him again, shall be entitled to the above reward. BENJAMIN POULTNEY.
N.B. All masters of vessels, and others, are warned not to carry him off, or conceal him, at their peril.
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