In 1789, after four years of vigorous and useful service, too arduous for his age, he suffered a paralytic stroke, which obliged him to leave the army. He lived, however, to see his country free and prosperous, surviving to the year 1790, when he died, aged seventy-three. I saw his commission as major-general hanging in the house of one of his grandsons, Colonel A. P. Putnam, at Nashville, some years ago. He has descendants in every State.
GEORGE FLOWER.
PIONEER.
Travelers from old Europe are surprised to find in Chicago such an institution as an Historical Society. What can a city of yesterday, they ask, find to place in its archives, beyond the names of the first settlers, and the erection of the first elevator? They forget that the newest settlement of civilized men inherits and possesses the whole past of our race, and that no community has so much need to be instructed by History as one which has little of its own. Nor is it amiss for a new commonwealth to record its history as it makes it, and store away the records of its vigorous infancy for the entertainment of its mature age.
The first volume issued by the Chicago Historical Society contains an account of what is still called the "English Settlement," in Edwards County, Illinois, founded in 1817 by two wealthy English farmers, Morris Birkbeck and George Flower. These gentlemen sold out all their possessions in England, and set out in search of the prairies of the Great West, of which they had heard in the old country. They were not quite sure there were any prairies, for all the settled parts of the United States, they knew, had been covered with the dense primeval forest. The existence of the prairies rested upon the tales of travelers. So George Flower, in the spring of 1816, set out in advance to verify the story, bearing valuable letters of introduction, one from General La Fayette to ex-President Jefferson.
With plenty of money in his pocket and enjoying every other advantage, he was nearly two years in merely finding the prairies. First, he was fifty days in crossing the ocean, and he spent six weeks in Philadelphia, enjoying the hospitality of friends. The fourth month of his journey had nearly elapsed before he had fairly mounted his horse and started on his westward way.
It is a pity there is not another new continent to be explored and settled, because the experience gained in America would so much facilitate the work. Upon looking over such records as that of George Flower's History we frequently meet with devices and expedients of great value in their time and place, but which are destined soon to be numbered among the Lost Arts. For example, take the mode of saddling and loading a horse for a ride of fifteen hundred miles, say, from the Atlantic to the Far West, or back again. It was a matter of infinite importance to the rider, for every part of the load was subjected to desperate pulls and wrenches, and the breaking of a strap, at a critical moment in crossing a river or climbing a steep, might precipitate both horse and rider to destruction.
On the back of the horse was laid, first of all, a soft and thin blanket, which protected the animal in some degree against the venomous insects that abounded on the prairies, the attacks of which could sometimes madden the gentlest horse. Upon this was placed the saddle, which was large, and provided in front with a high pommel, and behind with a pad to receive part of the lading. The saddle was a matter of great importance, as well as its girths and crupper strap, all of which an experienced traveler subjected to most careful examination. Every stitch was looked at, and the strength of all the parts repeatedly tested.