Letter signed Joseph Burnap, Ottawa, Ill, to Parents, Joseph Burnap, Wilmington, Mass., April 13, 1834
Digital Image
Identifier: A1427-00037
Language of Materials
English
- Saint Louis History Collection | Letter signed Joseph Burnap, Ottawa, Ill., to Parents, Wilmington, Mass. I will give you a short history of my adventures since I wrote last. I left New Orleans on the 26th of January on the Steamboat “Boonslick” for St. Louis, and in 8 days we arrived at the mouth of the Ohio. We were detained five days because of ice in the Mississippi. Arrived in St. Louis the 13th of February. When I left New Orleans there was considerable cholera; some on the boat after leaving. Passage from Orleans to St. Louis cost me $33. I found St. Louis a handsome and flourishing town and a place of business. I brought letters to J. & C. Walsh of St. Louis, and from Alfred Skinner of Andover to his father who is in the firm of A. & W. Skinner, St. Louis. They are among the most respectable merchants of St. Louis. I made inquiry there into teaching and surveying public lands. There is not much doing in the district over which the Surveyor General at St. Louis has control, which include the states of Missouri and Illinois, and all the public land for which appropriations had been made to survey under contract. In 4 or 5 days after arriving at St. Louis I set out for Jacksonville, Ill., one hundred miles from St. Louis. [Description] Looked into teaching work there and at Carrollton, on my way back to St. Louis, but salaries were so low I engaged at Alton to go as assistant in public land surveying business with Mr. Don Alonzo Spaulding. He has contracted to survey about ten townships of Congress land in the n.e. part of this state. I am to receive $20 per month. Mr. Spaulding lives in Alton, on the east side of the Mississippi, 22 miles above St. Louis and 4 miles above the mouth of the Missouri River. Methods of surveying and prices paid for surveying Congress land and territory we will serve. Description of Ottawa, its rich and productive lands. An old French settlement near here has grown 100 bushels of corn to the acre for the last 100 years. Discussion of wooden clocks, peddlers who have flooded the market with them., 1834 Apr 13
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