The Potter Family

My father, Charles R. Potter, was 21 when they were married, having left his home in Owego, N.Y. the year before to come to Illinois where he had relatives. He and his father never agreed very well, so he left home and came west, as Illinois was considered at the time.

After their marriage, they came to Muscatine, Iowa, where my oldest brother was born. However, the Civil War was on now and my father volunteered and spent three years in the service until the close of the war. He was wounded in action and after his recovery his leg still was in bad shape so he was stationed in Michigan at an arsenal there and sent for my mother to come, too, which she did. They were there for a year or more, or until the close of the war. My sister was born there. My brother then was a very pretty 3 year old boy and a great favorite with the soldiers, and spent much time at their tents and stations, often making it very hard for my mother to keep track of him.

At the close of the war, my parents returned to their home in Iowa, where my father took up his trade as a carpenter. All six of the Potter boys were carpenteres [sic] or cabinet makers. My father did much contracting or else building houses and selling them. Often he would build a house for themselves and just get moved in when he would sell it and then build another, thus keeping them on the move every few months. His father, Grandfather Potter, was one of the finest cabinet makers I ever knew; none of his boys could compare with him in fine cabinet work. There are still many pieces of grandfather's work around through the family. . . .

When people began to migrate to Nebraska in '74 and '75, he got the fever too and came out to Red Cloud where his brother, John Q. was, and where he had a grist mill and also a saw mill.

There was a lot of timber on the creeks and river at that time. There was burr oak and elm, box elder, cottonwood, etc. I think the burr oak might have been too hard to saw. Anyway, I never knew of them using it, but uncle saved and sawed up the cottonwood to build his home of it. He had never seen it before and soon found it warped and rotted in a very short time. He dammed the Republican river 1 1/2 miles west of Red Cloud and every spring or high water time, had a lot of grief with the dam or parts of it going out, as the old Republican river is just as treacherous there as it [is] every place else.

My father bought a farm 2 1/2 miles south of town on Penny Creek, which was named for the man who homesteaded our farm . . . . There were 40 acres of heavy timber on this creek. All of the houses and buildings were built of logs. All of the people of the vicinity had lived there as protection from the Indians who roamed up and down the river hunting and fishing. they still came once or twice a year after we came there in about 1875 but were always friendly. . . . 

After my father bought the land in Nebraska and we were planning to come west to settle on it, my mother began to prepare for any emergency. She knew of the grasshopper year before we came, so she dried fruits and corn. She had about a bushel of dried corn and did everything possible to be ready for anything that might arise. She was a very resourceful woman.

We started from our home in Iowa on August 31st in 1875 and were 5 weeks on the road. We had three covered wagons - two large lumber wagons and a light spring wagon in which my mother and we younger children rode and where our clothing, bedding and the food we would need on the trip was carried. Mother drove this wagon as she was a fine horsewoman and could always manage a horse or team better than my father who had never handled horses much.

For the heavy wagons, they had a heavy team of horses and big team of young mules, not two [sic] well broke. The furniture and heavy things were put in these two heavy wagons. . . . My father drove one wagon and my oldest brother Edwin, then 14 years of age, drove the other.

We arrived at my uncle's, John Q. Potter, early in October, 1875 after being on the road for five weeks and never having slept in a house all those weeks or eating a meal only in the open and having it cooked over a camp fire. . . . With so many emigrants coming to a new country, it made the housing a very serious problem and as we could not have our place until the following spring, and living in wagons for the winter could not be thought of, my father finally found a little house in Red Cloud. It was about 16x24, I think. It had a floor and was just sided up with no sheeting or plaster but we had no choice but to live in it until spring. As it was all in one room, my mother hung up carpets for partitions and also hung them around the walls for extra warmth. She also laid rugs, etc. on the rafters to hold in what heat we could get. With all I remember, it was rather an uncomfortable winter.

Lincoln Nebraska State Journal, December 6, 1878

THE RED CLOUD MILLS,

owned and operated by Messrs. Potter & Frisby, are situated on the Republican river, about two miles from town. This mill is of course run by water, the celebrated Green Mountain turbine wheel being the propelling power. The dam is strongly constructed upon a rock foundation, as lasting as the rock of Gibraltar. The mill is three stories high, has four run of burrs, its grinding capacity is 300 bushels every 24 hours, the force necessary to run it is light, and It is kept constantly in operation, night and day, for nine months in the year.

All tho latest improved machinery is used, the new process for flour is employed, and in short the Red Cloud mills compare with any in the State. Messrs. P. & F. are also largely interested in the pork business, killing and shipping a large number each season.

These gentlemen have been here six years, and have had the mill in operation for the past four years.

From the Commercial Advertiser, August 3, 1931

Death Comes To Charles R. Potter

The last of the week S. N. Potter received the sad news of the death of his brother Charles R. Potter, who had made many friends in this community during his frequent visits here. This morning’s State Journal contained the following concerning Mr Potter:

“Charles R. Potter who seyenty-one years ago sat awed by the magic oratory of Abraham Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas died Saturday at the home of a son at Wilcox. His death erased from the records of Van Meter post of the G.A.R. the last member and past commander.

“Born March 3, 1839 in New York State he came west to Chicago as a lad of nineteen and saw the Illinois settlement surrounded by dykes to hold back the waters of Lake Michigan. In 1860 he rode forty miles in a jolting lumber wagon to Ottawa Illinois - where the immortal words of ‘Honest Abe’ were shouted in argument at the ’little giant’

“At Lincoln’s call Mr. Potter enlisted in company F of Nineteenth Iowa Volunteers three and one-half wounded three times Potter en-the Nine- l served for three and one-half years. He had been married in 1860 to Jennie McGould at Reading, Illinois, and after some years in Iowa they came in 1874 to a farm near Red Cloud where he built the first frame house in the county. It still stands as testimony to his handicraft. When he moved to Harlan county in 1879 he built a frame house and store east of Ragan and the settlement was christened “Freewater” by early freighters

“Funeral services will be conducted at Wilcox followed by rites at the First Methodist Episcopal church in Alma. He will be buried in Alma cemetery by the grave of his wife who died in 1923. Surviving him are five children: E. L. and E. R. Potter, Wilcox; Mrs Ora Hutchinson, Morrill; Mrs. F. Stevens, Orleans; N. F. Potter, Alma; twenty-six grandchildren, fifty great grandchildren.”

(By Attorney Jas. S. Gilham)

Today’s Journal contains the story of the death of Charles R. Potter, a former resident of this County. Mr. Potter was the next to the youngest of a remarkable family of boys, at least five of whom, possibly six, have been Residents of Webster county. Spence Potter is the youngest of the brothers and the smallest in stature. With the exception of the deceased who was 92 years of age at his death, Spence is the longest lived. He is in his 90th year. Jacob and John Q. were the first of the brothers to make their home in this county. They built the first mill on the Republican rjver and John Q. built the first saw mill in the county. All the brothers were men of exceptionally good habits and of a high moral character. They all lived to be 80 years of age or older.John Q. was 87 when he died. Jacob was about 80.Cephas, or probably Sebra, came in later years. He was the oldest of the brothers who came to this country. It is possible there was one older than he who 'did not come so far west. Charles R. was the heaviest of them all, weighing something over 250 pounds in his prime. Two of them were soldiers in the civil war. Last week Spence told the writer that he had been up to see his brother and seventy of the relatives were gathered on that occasion, but it promised to be the last occasion on which the majority of them would see the deceased alive. He had yielded to the infirmities of old age. He had become blind and had lost his vitality in other respects. It is given to few to live such a long and successful life and to pass away surrounded by so many relatives and friends.