A Light In the Wilderness by author Jane Kirkpatrick (Revell, 2014) is a historical novel with its main focus on the character, Letitia, a freed slave. Letitia was a slave on the Bowman plantation in Kentucky. William and Sarah (Kindred) Bowman had freed her, and eventually their other slaves. In Missouri, Letitia was there with the Bowmans. She was a friend of the family. The book mentions Letitia’s interactions with Sarah Bowman and her daughter, Artmesia. Letitia had met an Irishman, David Carson whom she loved. In 1844, the Bowmans traveled on to Oregon, leaving Letitia behind. One year later, in 1845, Davey Carson and Letitia (now married) go to Oregon.
In Oregon, they settle on a land claim in the Soap Creek Valley in Benton County Oregon. David Carson is able to claim only 320 acres, not the usual 640 acres for a couple, because Letitia is black. Also, somewhere along the way to Oregon, Letitia’s papers are lost which authenticated her freed state. Greenberry Smith, a neighbor, becomes her nemesis when he challenges her freed state. Things turn ugly, only to be later turned into court battles in which Letitia becomes victor.
Greenberry Smith was a fellow neighbor in both Missouri and in Oregon who traveled with their wagon train. He had been a slave patroller, looking out for runaway slaves. Another neighbor traveling with the Carsons was Nancy Hawkins. On the trip, her husband died in an Indian attack, and she later remarried in Oregon to another neighbor, Thomas Reed. Nancy is a very caring friend and neighbor for Letitia, in Missouri and in Oregon.
Here is a picture of the neighborhood as pictured in the 1850 census in Benton County, Oregon:
The Windbreaker: George Washington Bush, Black Pioneer of the Northwest by Iris White Heikell (Baker, 1980) tells of another story of a black pioneer, this one focusing on George Washington Bush. George was born a freeman, a son of a wealthy black man and an Irish woman. He was a veteran of the War of 1812 and a mountaineer. In 1844, a wagon train including George Washington Bush and family, and his white neighbors traveled in 1844 from Missouri to Oregon. This group included William and Sarah (Kindred) Bowman and family, Sarah’s parents, David and Talitha Kindred, and Sarah’s sister’s family, Michael and Elizabeth (Kindred) Simmons, and family! And others.
Upon arriving in Oregon, this wagon party was greeted by news that the Provisional Government of Oregon voted to exclude blacks from living in Oregon. This ruling was partly anti-slavery, but it was also anti-black. John McLoughlin of the Hudson’s Bay Company advised the company that George could settle north of the Columbia River, which was beyond Oregon law. All of the families but the Bowmans went north to settle. The Bowmans settled in Polk County, Oregon. Shortly after 1852, William Bowman died. Later in 1852, Sarah Bowman remarried a widower, David Davis. The 1860 census shows a blended family of Davis and Bowman children, plus two daughters, Mary and Hannah Davis.
While Iris Heikell, in her book, shows Sarah as sympathetic towards Geoege Bush’s plight and unfair treatment, Jane Kirkpatrick shows Sarah as open to interracial friendship but opposed to interracial marriage. Sarah’s daughter, Talitha, married David Davis’ business friend, James O’Neal, one of those men who were in the Provisional Oregon government. Artemesia, another of Sarah’s daughters, is mentioned early in Kirkpatrick’s book. She is not found in Oregon, but she was living up where her maternal grandparents were in the future Washington territory.
My book, Our Davis Pioneer Ancestors, has Sarah living with her blended family in 1860:
Sarah in Our Davis Pioneer Ancestors
Greenberry Smith, the antagonist in Kirkpatrick’s book, was also an antagonist in my book. He is pictured as a ‘banker’ who loaned out money to the local settlers. He got even more wealthy after he took their land after his neighbors defaulted on their loans.Greenberry Smith in Our Davis Pioneer Ancestors
