(114) NOTE.-- The narrative of Mr. Bennett in regard to the misfortune that befell David Cossairt has been slightly changed, for he reason that his information was incorrect in one or two particulars.

     THOSE who were caught away from home any distance and attempted to go home in the storm either perished or were badly frozen. Mr. David Cossairt, living in St. Clair valley as it is now called, but was then known as the Blankenship settlement, was down to the steam saw-mill on the Elkhorn, a distance of about six miles, with his team, getting out saw-logs. He started home, little realizing while working in the timber how bad he storm was out on the prairie. He was told by some that it was dangerous for him to start home, but he thought that he could make it all right with an empty wagon. He got within a mile or two of home and dark came on. He got into a snowdrift and his horses got down and the snow was flying so thick that he could not see any distance, nor where he was, nor which way to go. So he took the harness off the horses and let them go to look out for themselves, and for himself found a place under a bank that gave some shelter from the wind. Here, with a quilt for a cover, he went into a snow camp for the night. But the dawn of day brought no relief; the storm was raging, if possible, worse and worse, and getting colder all the time, and anther day and night had to be passed in that camp of snow and until late the next day before the storm ceased. His horses drifted with the wind and brought up at a neighbor's four or five miles away. He was badly frozen, hands (115) and feet, and had crawled out and was trying to find his way homeward when first discovered."

     [NOTE. -- He was rescued by A. C. Blankenship, who saw him wandering around on the prairie some distance away. He would have gotten home all right alone, but just after leaving his snow camp he was attacked with snow-blindness, so that he could not see his way. By careful and intelligent nursing he recovered. He got over his blindness in a day or two.]

     "Two men living over near the head of Battle Creek (Madison County) perished in the same storm. Two brothers they were, and married to two sisters, each having a young babe near the same age. It so happened that less than two years after, I stayed all night at their father's and they were both there with their children, so I got the story from their own lips. Their statement of the facts I will relate.

     "When it first commenced snowing the men, with a neighbor, thought it would be a good time to kill a deer in some of the brush thickets along the Battle Creek breaks, so they each took a blanket to wrap around them and their guns and set out for their hunt, perhaps as fearless of getting lost as a company would be to start out on a chicken hunt. But, the storm increased in violence and the snow accumulated rapidly. They hunted until they got a deer and then started for home, as they thought, but night came on and no home was found. They then gave up that they were lost. They then traveled on for some time, but no signs of home. They became wearied and discouraged, and coming into the head of a narrow, steep gulch, where the wind did not seem to strike very hard, the two brothers declared they would go no farther. They argued that they each had a blanket, and they could kick a hole under the snow, wrap up in their blankets, and stand it until morning or till the storm ceased. The other man thought he would rather risk his life traveling, so he went on and left them. He studied the matter over and thought it was not near so hard (116) walking to go straight with the wind, and several miles' travel in that direction would take him up to the settlement on Shell Creek. So he kept the course straight as he could and about four o'clock in the morning he found a house. The other two perished and their bodies were not found until the following spring when the snow melted away."

      [NOTE.- The men who lost their lives were the Moon brothers; the man who was saved was James McMahan.]

     After the storm was over Mr. Bennett went to Iowa, returning to Antelope County again in the spring of 1872, but without his family, as he had not been able to sell his farm in Ringgold County, Iowa. He built a combination house, half sod and half dugout, on his place, and leased thirty acres of ground in the northwest quarter, section 5, Cedar township, and put in a crop, and while cultivating corn in July took part in the buffalo hunt mentioned in Chapter II of this history. He thus, in his own quaint way, gives his experiences:

     "The first settlers kept coming and going till but few of them are here to-day. But when we consider the hardships and privations that had to be endured, so far from market for produce and needed supplies, it is not so surprising that the more tender footed ones that couldn't stand traveling on hard roads should abandon their chances here and go back to Egypt. For my part I had been used to hard roads and hard times and expected it when I came here.

     "We got our house so we could live in it before we commenced plowing corn, for we had to tend it in the old style -- one-horse double-shovel plow, going two or three times in a row -- and it being broke so late the sod was very tough and required considerable scratching. One day while we were out there plowing corn, in the fore part of July, 1872, we spied some strange looking animals coming toward us from the west. They were three in number -- two large ones and one small one. They were about half a mile away, but feeding and walking straight toward us. They were in the valley or flat on the northeast (117) quarter, section 6, Cedar township, and we were on the height on the northwest quarter, section 5, and by driving a few rods farther over the slope of the hill we were out of sight, though they had not yet seemed to notice us. We stood where we could just peep over and watch them, and we soon discovered they were buffalo. They came straight toward us till they came near the plowed ground, and, strange to say, the two large ones turned south and the small one turned north and went out of our sight in that direction. The other two kept on walking and feeding until they had gone south about half a mile and then turned back west. We had no guns with us, but wanted some buffalo meat and consulted as to the best way to get it. I told my nephew (John Bennett) to watch them, but not go near to scare them, and I would go over east to Palmer's and get them to help us. So we threw the harness off our horses and I galloped away on one for help. After a two-mile ride I found both of the Palmers plowing corn. I told them that if they wanted some buffalo meat to throw the harness from their horses and get their guns in haste, as I had a man watching the buffalo.

     "It was but a few minutes till we were galloping toward the battle-ground. Our watchman had got on the highest peak so he could watch for us and still keep in sight of the buffalo. When we came together the buffalo were over a mile ahead and still feeding west -- going right toward where Elgin now stands. . We consulted and planned for the attack. Two of us not having any guns with us, and not knowing how fast the buffalo could run when they were frightened, and each of us having a gun at the sod fort, we thought it best to go that way and get the guns and ride away around, get ahead of them, and attack them about the top of a hill a couple of miles or so southwest of Elgin. E. Palmer went around on the north side, A. Palmer and J. Bennett on the south side, and I followed in the rear with the greyhounds, so if they were likely to outrun our horses we would try the greyhounds to bother them. But when they raised the hill, E. Palmer wounded (118) both of them, breaking a foreleg of one above the knee. They kept their course, right on. The other two hunters got in ahead of them, but they had to shoot and fall back, for the buffalo followed them right up. After about twelve or fifteen shots they got them both down about a quarter of a mile apart, and they had them both dead before I got to them. It was a hot day, and while they took the entrails out and kept the flies away, I went home and got the wagon -- something over two miles. I drove to the farthest one, took the hind wheels off, let the hind end down, pulled one animal in, pulling its neck up to the fore-gate, and then, putting up the wheels, rolled back to the other one and done the same way, pulling it in far enough to get the end-gate in, put up the wheels, and rolled for the shanty. By the time we got there and got our buffaloes skinned it was night. We kept one and the Palmers one, and I hauled theirs right over while in the wagon. We cut the bone mostly out of ours, put it in brine for three days, and then hung it up in the back end of the sod shanty, hanging some quilts in front to darken and keep the flies out; keeping a little smoke in the daytime. When dried we thought it excellent. Both were males about three years old."