Alanson Peck Hammond & Elizabeth Schermerhorn

Children of Alanson Peck Hammond and Elizabeth Schermerhorn

Alanson Peck Hammond

Elizabeth Schermerhorn

Elizabeth Schermerhorn Hammond moved with her husband and children from
LaGrange Co., IN to Montfort WI in 1859 where they lived until 1868 when
they decided to try their fortune in Dakota Territory. They accompanied
by Alanson's father and mother and an orphaned grandson of the Hammond's
Charles J. Fox, Jr., then a youth of nineteen.
Alanson had a team of horses and a covered wagon while the others
drove a yoke of oxen hitched to their covered wagon. The progress was
slow and they stopped for a few days to visit relatives near Charles City
Iowa. Three weeks after leaving Montfort they arrived at Vermillion
Dakota Terriotory. The three children of the party enjoyed the trip
immensely. Sarah often rode one of the horses or one of the oxen when
they were crossing the various sloughs, which were common on the trail
across Iowa. There were two sloughs which were especially hazardous to
the pioneers. The first was called Purgatory and the second Hell
Slough. When they came to Purgatory the men unhitched both horses and
oxen and the children drove them to dry land on the opposite side. Ropes
were then run through the ends of the wagon tongues and the wagons were
towed across the slough. The same procedure was followed in crossing
Hell Slough but the crossing was not as successful as in the first
instance. Elizabeth was left in the Hammond wagon alone. When the wagon
reached the middle of the slough it gave a sudden lurch and a prized
bureau containig all of the best clothes in the family wardrobe pitched
headlong into the muddy water. After much labor it was rescued but every
article had to be removed fron it and washed and dried at the next
stopping place. When the Hammond's reached Vermillion they were besieged
by millions of mosquitoes. They were so bitten that they became
discouraged and were about to return to WIsconsin. One Sunday morning a
jolly young Irishman came riding by in a buckboard. He saw their plight
and told they to accompany his to Yankton where he could locate them a
homestead where the mosquitoes would not annoy them. They followed his
advice and filed on a quarter section of land eight miles northeast of
Yankton. The Irishman whose name wa James Walsh, later became partner of
Alanson in the sawmill business in Yankton. In later years he married
and lived on his homestead and was a neighbor of Sarah Hammond DeVoe for
many years.
At the time the Hammond's filed on their homestead ther government
permitted the shanties to be built on the line between the homesteads, so
the families built a double shanty with boards up right and the cracks
left open to provide better ventilation in summer. Earlier settlers had
told Alanson that there was no winter in Dakota until December. So the
families settled Elizabeth and her children in one end of the shanty and
Grandfathre and Grandmother Hammond and Charles Fox in the other while
Alanson went to Yankton to establish his sawmill business and prepare a
winter home for the family.
All went well until one day in early October whenthe air was soft
and balmy. It began to snow gently and increased steadily. The next day
the wind rose and a blizzard was in progress. There was nothing to do
but for everybody to go to bed and cover up as tightly as possible to
keep warm. The snow drifted into the open cracks of the shanty. They
were afraid to build a fire for fear they shanty would catch on fire from
the stove pipe through the roof which was thier only chimney. They ate
cold food until the storm abated the third day. Elizabeth then baked
potatoes in the ashes and Sarah said that the meal of hot baked potatoes
wa the best she ever ate. Alanson was terror stricken when the blizzard
came on but he could not find his way to the homestead in the blinding
snow. After the storm was over he hired men to help him get his team
through the drifts. He was indeed grateful to find that his family had
passed safely through a Dakota blizzard. He immediately moved his family
and the other occupants to the safety of Yankton and they continued to
live there until Elizabeth's death in childbirth in June 1870.
Elizabeth Schermerhorn Hammond is buried in the Hammond-Fox block in
the Yankton Cenetery. The other occupants of the block are Grandfather
and Grandmother Hammond and Charles Fox and his wife Mary Brownson Fox.
The block is marked with a large tomb stone on which is the name Hammond.
Contributed by Blanche DeVoe Keith