their horns many times only to wane and the white chief came no more.”
As stated before, it is probable that Ellsworth visited Kenosha and it is likely, too, that on his way home he stopped at Muskegon and was with the Indians for a brief period, but that he remained there a year or more, as Mr. Goffe was told, or that he made any extended stay among the Redskins is highly improbable, though I realize that in expressing this opinion I am throwing ashes on what purports to be a romantic episode.
Returning to Mechanicsville and casting about for employment, Ellsworth recalled that in one of his trips between Troy and his home he had met on the train a gentleman from New York who, evidently attracted by his intelligent and prepossessing appearance, drew him into conversation and impressed himself favorably on the youth’s mind and memory. Thinking that this transient friend might help him, he inserted a “personal” in the New York Herald which in due time brought a letter from the gentleman, who proved to be a drygoods merchant, and after a preparatory correspondence Ellsworth was made a clerk in his store. This was in 1853, the year of his visit to the West and Kenosha.
DRAWING MADE BY COLONEL ELLSWORTH
Reproduced from the original in the Wisconsin Historical Library
Concerning the two years that he spent in New York I have been able to secure but fragmentary and disconnected data. He remained but half of this period in the employ of the merchant referred to and when, in 1855, he went to Chicago, he did so in company with a party of engineers by whom he had been employed in improving the channel at Hellgate, not far from New York. This work was carried on by the aid of divers who deposited the explosive on the surface of the rock and this being fired by electricity and confined somewhat by the weight of water effected considerable execution. Just what part Ellsworth played in this work or how long he was engaged in it is not known. While in New York he was afforded an opportunity of
acquiring a better knowledge of military tactics through the drills of the Seventh Regiment, which he attended on every available occasion.
He was eighteen years of age when, with his brother, he went to Chicago, hoping to make better progress in providing means for the ease, security, and happiness of their parents. For, while yet a little boy in Malta, having been pained by the cruel words of a companion who had sneeringly remarked that his mother wore “patched shoes,” he had told her that he would some day earn a lot of money so that she would be a lady as well as the best and “ride in a carriage.” This ambition for his mother, that she might “ride in a carriage,” was referred to hopefully in a letter dated Madison, Wisconsin, November 15, 1858. Though his brother, after remaining but a brief season in Chicago, seems to have given up the battle and returned home, Elmer held on and through the most discouraging experiences persevered and at last achieved a success which repaid him for all his suffering and humiliation.
Not long after his arrival in Chicago he engaged himself as a clerk to Arthur F. Devereux, of Salem, Massachusetts, who was in the patent soliciting business and who later became an officer in the Eighth Massachusetts Regiment. Ellsworth after a time became a partner with Mr. Devereux and the firm enjoyed prosperity when, through the defalcation of one whom they trusted, everything was lost and Elmer found himself without a dollar struggling again for the bare necessities of life. Three years had been passed in this business, as appears from Ellsworth’s own words. He writes: “In an evil hour I placed confidence in an infernal scoundrel, was robbed of everything in a moment, saw the reward of three years’ toil fade from my eyes when about to grasp it.”