And so the Spring of 1850 found Mr. Smith leaving his place in the composing room at Canandaigua and, after a brief farewell visit with his family in Victor, he proceeded to Centreville, Indiana, from which town he dated the first entry of his narrative. The journal itself tells the rest of the story, and I am sure that the student of western history will find it one of the most valuable of the contemporary journals of the Forty-Niners and the Overland Trail.
R. W. G. Vail.
The Minnesota Historical Society, March 20, 1920.
FOOTNOTE:
[1] A portrait of the author, painted in East Bloomfield, N. Y., is still owned by the family in Victor.—ED.
LETTER TO MOTHER.
April 10, 1853.
Dear Mother: