Cricket’s Trail: An Odyssey of Redemption Along the Trail of Tears

By John Hutchinson

Revenge, remorse, regeneration, and reconciliation are the driving themes of Cricket’s Trail, the story of two spiritual odysseys set against the relocation of the Cherokees in 1838. The story delves deeply into the issue of personal guilt and the need for repentance. It is infused with a strong Christian message that emphasizes personal conversion and reconciliation. It is told with tenderness and grit.

This is a good story, well told. From the perspective of a historian, it is clear the author has done his homework. In short, the context for the very interesting story rings with authenticity. The author’s use of description and metaphor places the reader in the scene of the action. It is a delightful read.
Lawrence O. Christensen, Ph.D.
Distinguished Teaching Professor EmeritusMissouri University of Science and Technology

Cricket’s Trail is a fast-paced story that pulls the reader in. The author has made this historical period come alive. It is a tale full of drama, never shirking from illuminating the human weaknesses inherent in each individual. The historical background is well-research and provides a rich backdrop to what is essentially an intimate story of revenge, desire, redemption and human fulfillment. An engrossing read!
Kimberly Estep, Ph.D.
Vice President for Academic Affairs and Professor
of History
Nashville State Community College

• Language: English
• Publisher: Elderberry Press
• Release date: Oct 19, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301430857

John Hutchinson

John M. Hutchinson, a speech/language pathologist by education and currently a higher education consultant, has served as a college administrator in Idaho, Montana, South Dakota, Georgia, and Florida. He is a former Episcopal clergyman and currently resides in Missouri with his wife Jean Ann and their marginally faithful dog, Toby, who is a backyard escape artist. Cricket’s Trail is his first novel.

Book preview

Preface

I should begin with the usual disclaimers that, unless otherwise noted, the characters depicted in this story are purely fictional and any resemblance, etc. etc. However, this isn’t really quite true is it? To some extent all novels have an autobiographical element, if the truth be known. For example, when I describe Hattie Hornbeak’s eyes, I had my wife’s in mind, though in significant other ways Hattie and my wife are quite different. I have known people with Burl Bumbalough’s operatic baritone, Crazy Snake’s hot temper, Auntie Anne’s wisdom, and Porky Snodgrass’s corpulent fingers. So, if you detect yourself or someone you know in these pages, please take comfort in the knowledge that the descriptions are at best composites of several individuals.

Every effort has been made to cast the story in the actual historical and cultural context in which it unfolds. The dates, places, and events are generally accurate as far as the current historical sources allow. The vocabulary is consistent with known usage at the time and if there are semantic anachronisms, it is accidental. To this end, historical and explanatory notes are provided at the end of the work. In addition, a brief bibliography is provided for those who would like further information.

As all authors rightly note, no work of this sort can be accomplished without the aid of others. Therefore, I would be remiss if I didn’t acknowledge the following individuals who aided me greatly. A very special thanks goes to Jackie Warfel of Bois D’Arc, Missouri who read the manuscript with a critical and very helpful eye. She also guided me along the actual Trail of Tears from Greene County, Missouri to Tahlequah, Oklahoma. Without her assistance, the novel would have been fare less accurate. I would also like to thank Dr. Lawrence Christensen, Distinguished Teaching Professor Emeritus of the Missouri University of Science and Technology, Rolla, and one of the leading Missouri historians for his critical review of the work. Thanks must also be extended to my colleague Dr. Kimberly Estep, Professor of History and Vice President for Academic Affairs at Nashville Community College for her examination of the story. I am indebted to Debra Underwood and Tom Berry of Underwood and Associates not only for their good work on the cover art but for their friendship as well. A tip of the hat also goes to David St. John, Executive Editor of Elderberry Press, for his encouragement and willingness to talk. It’s not easy these days to find a publisher or editor who will actually talk with you on the phone. Finally, a loving thanks to my wife Jean Ann who never wavered in her confidence that the story was worth telling, even when I had my doubts.

John M. Hutchinson

Ozark, Missouri

Part One

Thou turn’st mine eyes unto my very soul;

And there I see such black and grained spots

As will not leave their tinct.

Hamlet, Act III, Scene iv

…he had come into the midst of a whole company of rattlesnakes, which all had their mouths open and seemed to be crying. He asked them the reason of their trouble, and they told him that his own wife had that day killed their chief, the Yellow Rattlesnake, and they were just now about to send the Black Rattlesnake to take revenge.

The Rattlesnake’s Vengeance, Cherokee Myth

Chapter One

Shakes

Lust

Concupiscence. Do you know this word? I didn’t until a short time ago. It is a very exact word, a very important word. You see, concupiscence was the spark that set my life ablaze on the afternoon of March 2, 1839, the day the Cherokees came to town. The Cherokees have long since left, but that fire has never gone completely out. It smolders like a hot spot in a grass fire, flaring up from time to time to engulf me all over again. Indeed, I have taken pen in hand to write this memoir in hopes that the process of putting it all down on paper and giving it to you to read will somehow snuff this thing out for good. So let me tell you what happened. You’ll see what I mean by the precision and significance of the word concupiscence.

About four in the afternoon of the aforementioned day, Jedediah Pawlenty and I closed Lehman’s General Store for the day and repaired to the back room where we both bunked. Jed and I were employees in Squire Conrad Lehman’s establishment and had been for the better part of two years. Squire Conrad - we called him Old Conrad - lived in St. Louis and rarely ventured out west to String Town, but he had spotted a good thing when he saw it. He established a general store to take advantage of the economy spawned by the fledgling Massey Iron Works, hired Jed and me to run the store, and sat back in the comfort of his grand home in St. Louis to reap the profits of our labor in the hinterlands.

I’ll not digress on the Works, as we called it, right now. Suffice it to say, by 1839, there was a bustling community of ironworkers, colliers, and craftsmen who inhabited the area near Maramec Springs in the Ozark Mountain foothills of central Missouri. Many of the workers lived in cabins stretched out along a central road like beads on a string, hence the name String Town. Old Conrad built his store to the east of String Town by about a quarter mile. It opened on to a broad field of several acres that ran alongside an old Indian trail that had become the road from Steelville to Pay Down. Pay Down served as an access point on the Gasconade River some twenty miles away. From Pay Down finished iron could be floated up the Gasconade to the Missouri River and on to St. Louis.

On that Saturday, Jed and I were anxious to get into some serious corn whiskey consumption in preparation for a night of further drinking, card playing, and who knows what at the lodge hall near the company boarding house. Inasmuch as Old Conrad, not being of Baptist or Methodist persuasion, sold spirits in his general store, Jed and I had close to an unlimited supply for our own use. It’s safe to say that Old Conrad made nary a nickel on the liquor because Jed and I drank up all the profits. We were shrewd in other ways and had a knack for doctoring the books so that Old Conrad never suspected a thing.

Whoo-ee! I is quite ready to take a drag on that there jug, Shakes. Pass it right on over, Jed said as he plopped down on his bunk, the impact of which produced a loud and malodorous fart.

And here I must take a short diversion before going on with the story. My name is actually Zebulon Quincy Parker. Now, I never minded my surname of Parker but Zebulon and Quincy were a bit much so I actually welcomed the nickname Shakes, which got affixed to me shortly after my arrival in String Town. I had the good fortune of some education, ten years pretty much straight through. This made me the second-most educated man in town behind the doctor, Thomas Bridgestone. I loved to read and had among my few possessions a leather-bound volume of selected plays and sonnets from the Bard himself, William Shakespeare. It was my prize possession. Of course, I immersed myself in its pages on many an occasion so it’s no surprise that Jed and others started to call me Shakespeare or Shakes for short.

Here, I said handing the jug to Jed. Cork’s jammed in there. See if you can fish it out.

Ain’t no cork gonna keep me from my likker. Hand me that there knife on the wall. I’ll git ‘er out.

After reducing the cork to crumbles, Jed sucked down a couple of shots, which he punctuated with a spew of cork fragments and a satisfied belch. He passed the jug back to me and I followed suit, including the belch. I had to force the belch. Despite my proper upbringing and education, I felt the need to behave rudely upon occasion so I would fit in with the locals, be made a part of their unlettered and unrefined company. They were all I had by way of community after all. Without them, I would have been thrust upon my own solitary resources, a circumstance I desired to avoid.

Whooee! That burns going down but it shore do bring on a sweet peace, don’t it? he said.

Yup. Can mellow a fellow, I said.

Jed snickered, "Shakes, you got a way with words. You done tickled my funny bone with that’n right thar - mellow a fellow."

As we were thus occupied, a racket slowly entered our awareness and we paused to cock an ear. There were shouts, the clatter of hooves, and the crunch of wagon wheels.

Whatcha s’pose that might be Shakes? Jed asked.

Do not know. Let’s investigate, I said.

We arose from our bunks and, with the jug in hand, opened the door at the rear of our room and coursed one hundred and eighty degrees around the building - I had read a bit in Euclidian geometry - to the front of Lehman’s General Store. There we beheld one of the strangest sights to be imagined. Marching into the field before us was a horde of Indians, hundreds of them, selecting campsites, pasturing livestock, and beginning the process of settling down. Some were in wagons, some on horseback, but most came on foot. Men, women, children, and babes in arms.

What the…? Jed’s mouth fell open, as I suppose did my own.

I’ll be plumb flummoxed, I said.

We lapsed into silence as we took up our roost on the front porch to watch this incredible spectacle unfolding before our eyes. Of course, we continued to pull on the whiskey jug.

Look at ‘em Shakes. They’s all wore out.

Wonder where they come from, I said. Look downcast and forlorn, ask me.

Skinny little critters,

Proud though. Lookee at that old bird over there, the one with the old fashioned tricorn hat. He looks like a wise old codger. Wonder if he’s a chief.

Could be I s’pose. Where you figure they’s headin’ Shakes.

No idee. Wonder if that gray-haired squaw is the old bird’s wife. Seems like it could be. I had just re-read King Lear. I turned to Jed who was wiping a drip of corn whiskey from his chin. "You know, Jed, that woman reminds me of Cordelia in King Lear. Just before she and Lear were taken into captivity she said We are not the first who have incurred the worst. For thee oppressed king, I am cast down and could out-frown false fortune’s frown."

Jed looked at me as if I had just sprouted a second head. This was not an uncommon reaction in String Town. I have the uncanny ability to fix certain passages I might read in the recesses of my memory so I can draw them up at will with nearly word-for-word recall. I’ve had this knack for as long as I can remember. I demonstrated it from time-to-time. It was appreciated by some but most of the time I sprouted a second head.

Jed pointed to a young man and woman near the older couple. S’pose them growed chilluns belong to them?

I reckon.

Them two young ‘uns don’t look so Injun like. Seems they’s lighter skinned. See what I mean, Shakes?

Yeah, I seed that too.

We took a few more pulls on the jug. Jed’s speech was losing precision but it didn’t stop his chatter.

Ain’t this the most amazing sight of yer life, Shakes? What you s’pose they is? Chickasaws? Creeks maybe?

Sure ain’t Osages, I said. Somewhat shorter of stature.

Jed guffawed at this and shoved my shoulder, nearly knocking me off my chair. I looked over at him to behold a wide grin that was most unappealing to view. Jed had a few snags of velvety teeth and he was one of those souls who, when he grinned, displayed a might too much of his upper gum. This, combined with his unruly and unkempt red hair, gave him a downright idiotic look.

"You kill me Shakes. Whoever says shorter of stature. You is somethin’ else."

I smiled with him and went on, Them Osages is tall. Most of the men is over six foot. These Injuns is a tetch shorter, don’tcha see? Handsome breed though, I’d say.

Speakin’ o’ handsome, lookee here, Shakes.

Jed drew my attention to a young Indian woman in a red gingham dress, one of the grown children to whom he had previously referred. She had broken away from her family and crouched low to chase a young calico cat that had recently taken up residence in Lehman’s General Store.

She’s a right purty little squaw, ain’t she Shakes?

Agreed.

Whooee, I’d hanker to have a roll in the hay with her, opportunity presents itself.

"She’s a might young, don’tcha think?

Young. Hell’s fire, she’s twenty, she’s a day.

We watched her trail the kitten in our general direction with outstretched hand and kissing noises. From time to time the little animal would stop and look back at her but as the woman drew near, the kitten would scamper a few feet further away. This seemed to amuse Jed who began to emit little laughing snorts. These wet, congestive, and quite repulsive noises invariably surfaced as his inebriation progressed.

She ain’t never gonna catch that cat, Jake announced amid his snorts.

We continued to watch her as she followed the kitten around the north side of the store until both were out of sight. I returned my attentions to the activity in the field before me.

I believe I’m gonna gather some information about this procession through our fair town, I said, taking another pull on the corn whiskey. Seems that feller there might be able to enlighten us as to what’s goin’ on.

With that I passed the jug back to Jed and made my way over to a man standing beside his horse. He wore a black frock coat and a wide brimmed black hat.

Pardon, me, good sir, I said, Mind clarifyin’ what this is all about?

He turned toward me and extended his right hand. Good day, he said. I’m Reverend Elias Washburn.

Remembering my manners, I received his hand with a firm grip. "It’s good to meet you Reverend Washburn. Zeb Parker, but the local residents refer to me as Shakes."

He turned back to watch the somber scene before us, apparently quite incurious about my nickname.

Is this not the saddest sight you have ever seen? he asked.

It seems so. What manner of event is this?

This, Mr. Parker, is a forced emigration of Indians - Cherokees to be precise. These good people have been withdrawn from their homes, their land, their way of life in order to be relocated to Indian Country.

Indian Country?

Yes, sir.

But, pray tell, why?

By order of the United States Government.

What have they done?

Nothing. Absolutely nothing. You should know that these peaceful and civilized people have done nothing to provoke this unseemly extradition. Greed for land and the lawless oversight thereof has prompted the government to force this calamity upon them. They have broken no treaty. They have violated no law. They have abused no agents or officers of the United States.

You mean they’re being shoved off their land and deported to the West just so their lands can be taken? Isn’t that unlawful?

Yes, of course, but the U.S. government has a signed treaty. The suffering you see before you is the result of the actions of a few rogue individuals of their tribe, the so-called Treaty Party under one Major Ridge, who assumed authority and journeyed to Washington where they presented themselves as the authorized leadership of the Cherokee nation. These illegitimate delegates capitulated to the will of the whites and signed a treaty that rendered their people homeless.

What would prompt them to do such a thing?

Oh, no doubt, they thought they were doing the right thing. Thought they were saving their people from bloodshed. Things moved swiftly after the treaty was signed. Our very own President Andrew Jackson urged ratification of the treaty and the Senate complied. And so, the entire Cherokee nation was rounded up at gunpoint, incarcerated, and thus began the great removal project.

But this can’t be the whole Cherokee nation.

No, just a portion of it. More specifically, this group is referred to as the Taylor Detachment. Richard Taylor is our conductor.

Do declare, I said, quite amazed at such a cavalcade of events. I find it surprising, Reverend Washburn, that others did not oppose this action of such a group of unauthorized representatives. Surely such a decision could have been challenged. Did nary a soul rise up in protest?

Some did. See that man down there in the old-fashioned hat?

Yes. Noticed him a moment ago.

That’s Ezekiel Walden. He’s one of the revered chiefs of the Cherokee people. He vigorously opposed the relocation and denounced those who had executed the treaty on behalf of the Cherokee Nation. But it was to no avail. The treaty had been signed by those with apparent authority, the whites wanted no other outcome, and the relocation became inevitable.

May I ask, sir, why you are in their accompaniment?

I have labored among the Cherokee for nearly fifteen years now, endeavoring to bring the good news of our Lord to these people. My wife and I could certainly not abandon them in this hour of their despair. Thus, we march with them trying to bring the comfort of the Gospel to them wherever we can.

I find this whole matter rightly incredulous, I said. Tell me, when did you begin this trek?

The Indians were mustered last summer in the region of the Citico and Chickamauga creeks in far eastern Tennessee, if you are familiar with those parts.

Last summer! You’ve been on the march since last summer?

"If you take it from the beginning of the roundup. This group went overland through Tennessee, across Illinois, and into Missouri here. It’s been painstaking and slow. Some days we can only make five or six miles. Wagons break down. People are tired and sick. Weather can cause big delays. Dozens have died and have been buried, if you can call heaping a thin layer of stones over a body burying. Fact is we have four people to bury up on a hillside yonder who died within the last day or so."

I do not note any soldiers or officers of the government overseeing this migration and assuring that these folk reach their destination.

Good point, Reverend Washburn said. Some of the earlier marches were supervised by the Army. However, this one is under the recognizance of the chiefs.

Don’t some folks try to escape?

To be sure, there have been some. Escapes were more common in the early weeks of the march. Some felt they could retreat to their native lands in the east, hide out, and wait for the whole matter to die down. Some of them were probably successful. Hard to tell. However, as we’ve moved further west and settlements have become fewer and fewer I suppose most have concluded that their best option is to stay with their leaders for safety and keep their families intact as much as is possible under the circumstances. Most of these folks here are resigned to their fate in Indian Country.

I nodded. We watched the progress of encampment, which I noted to be orderly and efficient. Some minutes later, Reverend Washburn broke the silence.

I hear tell there’s a spring here.

Yes, sir. Maramec Spring. Beautiful spot just to the west of here behind that stand of trees yonder. One source of the Maramec River. Fresh water. Gin clear, if you take my meaning.

Reverend Washburn smiled. We plan to lay up for a couple of days and rest before pushing on. These people will appreciate fresh water and a peaceful place to rest. I note you have a boarding house in town. No doubt our physician will take advantage of such lodgings. My wife and I prefer to pitch our tent among the people where we can more immediately tend to their needs.

Your commitment stirs my heart, I said and whispered under my breath, "Give sorrow words. The grief that does not speak whispers the o'er-fraught heart, and bids it break."

Macbeth, he said.

You know it?

Favorite play. Malcom’s words…perfect, sadly perfect for this scene.

Despite my sorrow at the events unfolding before me, I felt a flush of pleasure that another soul shared my appreciation for the Bard. I said no more save to bade the Reverend Washburn farewell with expressions of hoped-for good fortune. I turned back to the store seeking another shot of whiskey and a chance to inform my doltish companion of the events of this strange afternoon.

Jed was nowhere in sight. His rocking chair stood motionless on the porch. I bounded up the two stairs and formed blinders with my hands in order to peer through the storefront windows to see if he had gone inside. I could see nothing. I stepped off the porch and headed to the back door of the store.

I heard the sounds of a scuffle and a plaintive, hollow voice sounding out with a mixture of English and what I took to be Cherokee.

Tla! Tla! Ho wat su! No! No! Please don’t!

I pushed open the creaky wooden door to our bunkroom. Jed had the young woman with the red gingham dress pinned on the fetid linens of his bed. She was putting up a forceful resistance and Jed clearly had his hands full.

Jed! What are you doin’?

C’mon in here Shakes and gimme a hand. She’s a feisty one.

Jed. Let her go.

I put my hand on his arm to pull him back. He shook it off.

Nothin’ doin’ Shakes. Gonna have a little fun here. Ain’t been with a woman in Lord knows how long. Time to remedy that sitiation. Now gimme a hand.

Jed, this is not right. Let her go. She’s done nothing to deserve this.

Ain’t gonna do it, Shakes! You gimme a hand. Good opportunity for you, Shakes. You always slobberin’ at the mouth when the boys at the Lodge start tellin’ they’s tales ‘bout congress with the ladies. ‘Bout time you got yerself a little story to tell. Now, go on and git that wad of leather thongs up front under the counter. We gonna tie her hands and feet to the bed legs and then we’ll both have a go at her.

Jed’s words hit me like a slap in the face, reminding me once again how much of a misfit I was in this rude company. Though most folks valued my work at the store, I was the outsider, often suffering painful baiting and taunting because of my interests, education, and language. I was String Town’s village oddity and, at that moment, in my bunkroom, suffering from Jed’s own derision, I felt more isolated and alone than I could ever remember. But…this…this opportunity that had suddenly been thrust upon me would go a long way toward curing my peculiarity in the eyes of my fellow townsmen, or at least that is what I thought at the time.

She’s jest a squaw, Shakes! Ain’t even human. No sin in beddin’ a squaw. Now go on. Gettin’ tired of holding her. Git on up there an’ git them straps.

For several long seconds, I watched her struggle against Jed. Terrified and beseeching. Her red gingham dress rode up several inches. My breathing quickened and I could feel a hard, dry knot form in my throat. My arousal consumed me and I hungered to subdue that fierce defiance and take her for myself? Oh yes, I could stop Jed. I was stronger and had the greater authority. She writhed and bucked. The leather thongs…the leather thongs…

Git the box, Shakes!

I did.

I closed my eyes and in one single point of decision, I yielded everything up to my passions. I lowered my head and flew to the front of the store. I reached under the counter and retrieved the box of leather straps.

When I returned, Jed had stifled the woman’s screams by stuffing a wad of dirty cloth in her mouth. She continued to thrash and lash out at Jed, wild-eyed like a filly in quicksand.

Hold her down, Shakes, while I tie her to the bed legs.

As I reached over to pin her arms, my fingers grazed the soft skin of her cheek and I was immediately reminded of the tiny duckling I had raised as a child on our Illinois farm. I would often hold this little creature in my left hand and stroke its breast with my right forefinger. The silkiness of that yellow down has been forever imprinted upon my memory.

Jed glanced up at me as he was tethering her. For hell’s sakes, Shakes, you kin look at her. Don’t got to stare off at the wall. Ain’t she got a fine figure?

Jed giggled, I swallowed hard, she snapped against her restraints with bulging muscles and neck cords taut with strain.

That orter do it, Jed said when he had finished tying her up. Go on now Shakes, git along. I prefer a bit of privacy. When I’m finished she’ll be all yours. You follow?

I nodded and retreated into the store with the whiskey jug. I sat down on a hard wooden bench and stared at the jars of canned fruit standing as silent witnesses to my gratification.

Images of the naked woman riffled through my mind and my breath quickened. She would be mine.

I would cross over that great equator of life that separates…

The boy from the men.

The outlander from the natives.

The lonely from the crowd of company.

No sin in beddin’ a squaw.

Blurred by the liquor, thus I waited on the tiptoe of expectation, relishing images in my mind.

I do not know how long I sat there sipping and savoring but at some point, quite unexpectedly, I heard a gnat-sized voice sounding in the back of my mind - the low plaintive cry of a young Indian woman supplicating me with her adaptation of Shylock’s soliloquy, I am a Cherokee. Hath not a Cherokee eyes? Hath not a Cherokee hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions…I took a deep breath and felt the pure stirrings of my conscience begin to percolate to the surface of my mind like the first bubbles in a boiling cauldron. I thought once more about rescuing the woman, of pulling Jed off of her and letting her go free.

I could still do it.

But oh how delicious it would be to have her…how delightsome.

I took several more swigs and juggled my scruples back and forth like a circus performer in the center ring of my soul.

No sin in beddin’ a squaw.

Hath not a Cherokee eyes?

Ain’t she got a fine figure?

She’s done nothing to deserve this.

She’s jest a squaw…Ain’t even human.

My fingers grazed the skin of her cheek…the silkiness of that yellow down…

I slammed down the whiskey jug, jumped from the bench, and raced into the bunkroom. In one quick move, I encircled Jed’s sweat-drenched body with my arms and tore him away from the bed. I grabbed his clothes, shoved them into his arms, and literally threw him out of the bunkroom and into the store. Desperately I closed the door, hoping to shut out those exclamations of delight and snorting giggles that told me with dreadful certainty I was too late. The deed was done.

I shook my crestfallen head but somehow managed to muster enough presence of mind to grab a blanket from my own bunk and, with eyes averted, spread it over the young Indian woman. I grabbed Jed’s knife, wiped the cork fragments from the blade, and in four quick slashes freed the woman. Slowly, warily she rose from the bed, clutching the blanket to her breast, her black eyes fixed upon me. Her expression was inscrutable. I could not tell if she were angry or grateful. Whatever emotion lay behind those piercing eyes, I could no longer hold her gaze. I lowered my head as shame flooded every pore of my being.

I pointed to the outside door of the bunkroom. Go, I said.

I turned and shuffled from the room.

Too late. My rescue had