Description

My Red Mother

The William and Hannah Harrison family joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in England and in 1856, set sail from Liverpool on the Ship Horizon. When they reached Iowa City, they became part of the Martin Handcart Company and partook of all the sufferings and extremity the Company endured. Things became so bad with reduced rations that one son, Aaron stayed at Fort Laramie, Wyoming, and joined the United States Army. It is recorded in the family records that Hannah, the mother, became so starved when her baby would nurse all she could get was blood. It is reported that Hannah actually made a snowball and asked the Lord to bless it. She said it tasted like manna.

But it is of their fourteen-year-old son George that I would like to speak. With the company on strictly reduced rations, George, who had already been ill with malaria, became so weak that he made the decision not to go on. He said,

“I slipped away into the willows that bordered the creek and hid. In the excitement, no one noticed my absence, not even my own folks. It was not long before the handcart caravan disappeared over a hill to the west. Why did I do this? Well, I was starving. I thought, if I thought anything clearly, that my family would be better off without me.”

For a few minutes he just stood there—alone. Then remembering an Indian camp about a mile back. George determined it better to take his chances with the Indians than sure starvation with the handcart company. He came to a tepee and boldly lifted the flap. He saw an Indian family inside. There was a mother and about a half-dozen children. He said,

They all stared at me in open-mouth astonishment. An iron kettle was on the coals of a fire in the center of the tepee. Something was cooking inside of it. Pointing to the kettle, I pleaded, “Give me some, give me some!”

She understood and dished up a large helping of boiled buffalo meat on a tin plate. George ate ravenously. When he finished, he held out the plate and asked for more. “Oh, exclaimed the red mother, with a touch of sympathy in her tone. She heaped my plate the second time,’ he said, “and I devoured the meat just as hungrily as before.”

When he had finished, the kind mother motioned for him to go. George stood up and as he did so, suddenly became dizzy and passed out cold on a pile of buffalo blankets, where he remained until the next day. Meanwhile, the husband of the Indian mother—a white mountain man– returned. Also, George’s father came back along the trail and found him. William was determined to take his son back, but the father said, “Why don’t you leave the boy here with the Indians. He will be much better off than to try to make that trip over the mountains with next to nothing to eat. That would simply be the death of him.”

The father protested “I cannot leave the lad here!”

“Well, you can’t take him,” said the mountaineer, “He can’t walk.”

“I’ll carry him, said George’s father.

“Oh, come now, old man. Be sensible. You can hardly carry yourself. Leave him here. The Indians will treat him alright and next spring he can go on with some other emigrant train.”

George’s father reluctantly agreed to let him stay. George would remain among the Indians for the next 14 months where he learned their ways and their language. In time, his clothes wore out.

He said, “My red mother made me a real Indian suit of buckskin…and fringed and beaded. I was an Indian boy for sure from head to foot when I put on these new clothes.”

When the time came for George to go on, he joined up with a group headed west, who hired him as a cook and took care of him. As he bid goodbye to his Indian mother, he said, “She felt very bad that I was leaving them and the papooses all cried.”

George went on and in 1858 found himself at Horseshoe Bend, near Fort Bridger, Wyoming. Across the River he saw an Indian Camp. Curious, he made his way over and discovered to his joy

“Sure enough,” he said, “it was my red mother and family…. All were delighted to see me. The papooses hugged my legs and danced with glee, but my Indian mother was troubled. Finally, she told me they were without food. This nearly broke me up. I remembered vividly how she shared with me when I first came to her tepee.”

George returned to his company and explained the situation and asked for some food. He was told firmly there was none to spare. George pleaded, and though his friends felt bad they said they could not spare any rations. George began to cry. Finally, the leader said he would see what he could do. He came back a short time later with a loaded sack of provisions—all that George could carry. He quickly returned to the tepee with his offering.

“You never saw a happier and more grateful people,” he said, “than those red friends of mine….It was small pay for all they had done for me.”

When he bid them goodbye, again, the papooses cried. He never saw them again.

“But,” he said, I have kept them close to my heart through all these years.”

Now, today, if only the folks in our world would just calm down, stop hating, and take care of each other like this. Oh, and by the way, one more thing, that company that hired George on, took care of him, brought the “Mormon boy” to Utah safely, and was so generous to his Indian family—they were soldiers of the United States Army on their way to Utah to put down the Mormons in what would be called the Utah War.

Sources:

https://www.familysearch.org/tree/person/memories/KWJQ-VMV