Hi Rex: What an interesting way to go about finding family! Well, I have a couple of families (connected of course) who came to Oregon from Cedar Co. Iowa in 1852. Anderson Hugh Brown, born in Estill Co. Ky, came to Cedar Co. Iowa with his parents, John and Malinda Brown, sometime before 1842. His grandfather, Hugh Brown also lived there at this time, and died in Cedar Co. A. Hugh's sister Jemima married Samuel Casebeer in Cedar Co., and in spring of 1852 they left for Oregon. Hugh, and his sister and brother-in-law, and their year old daughter. They arrived in Portland in the fall of 1852, so I assume they came on the typical "Oregon Trail," across southern Idaho, and across eastern Oregon. Hugh spend a year or two around Seattle, and then moved to Douglas Co. Oregon, just west of Roseburg. His sister and brother-in-law were already there. The Casebeers spent the winter in Portland, where their second child was born in Feb. of 1853, then on to Douglas County. I know nothing about their trip, except a story or two, told by her son, John L. Casebeer , many years later. One of them was about finding gold in eastern Oregon, which confirms the idea they came by the Oregon Trail, the other I will paste here. My mother (Jemima Brown Casebeer) was dead ten years before I was born! She caught yellow fever coming west on the wagon train, and went into a coma. The law of the wagon train was that when people died, they were buried at nightfall, and then a fire was built over the grave, then, in the morning, they ran the wagons over it to keep its presence unknown. (Indians were known to dig up the graves for clothing and other objects buried with the bodies.) Well, father (Samuel Casebeer) would not let them bury mother. He said they would wait until morning and then bury her. Come morning, she woke up. She said that she had known everything that happened, heard everything that was said, but just couldn't do anything about it. If father hadn't put his foot down there wouldn't have been any me, or fifty some grandchildren. Unfortunately, I do not know who else was on this wagon train. It was pretty rare for a whole family to die on the wagon trains though. It was more likely that a small child, or an elderly person died from the many diseases that were prevalent on the trains. Many of the trains had upward of 200 people, so that would only be 20 if indeed 10 percent is correct. It seems unlikely that a whole family died on the train very often. I hope you get some more information and will be very interested in it too. Margaret Behnke (A 5th generation living in Oregon) ----- Original Message ----- From: Rex <tmmaddox@seasurf.net> To: <IACEDAR-L@rootsweb.com> Sent: Friday, December 17, 1999 5:13 PM Subject: Cedar Co, IA > west to the gold fields > I would be interested in knowing any families who may have traveled west > between 1850 & 1853 from this area. My 3rd ggrandparents, Luther Roberts b > abt 1790 m Phoebe Jagger b 1788 NJ show up in the 1850 census in Rochester > twp shortly after leaving Licking Co., OH where they had lived since abt > 1825. Their children: > > Isaac Roberts b 1820 NJ > John Roberts b 1822 NJ m Malinda Brooks > Elias Roberts b 1823 NJ m Nancy?, m Martha Steeves > Orrin T J Roberts b 1829 OH > Phoebe Roberts b 1829 OH (twins) > > There is another daughter out there somewhere, possibly Mary who appears > near them married to Joshua Pence. Also, in John & Malinda's household is > Royal Beales b 1788 MA - carpenter, Seth Graham b 1830 OH - wagonmaker and > Richard Douglas b 1828 OH - Farmer. > > After this census, the entire family, including the 3 seemingly unrelated > people, disappears until my gggrandparents, John Roberts m Malinda Brooks > turn up in Jackson, Jacksonville, OR - 1853 (a gold-strike town). If > indeed, the entire family decided to take off for Oregon, surely, they did > not go alone - I would like to find other families who traveled with them - > the trail split at Utah and some may have gone on to California. One in 10 > people died along the Oregon trail, but I have lost the entire family! Any > advice would be greatly appreciated - they probably do all lie in unmarked > graves along the way, but I keep hoping to find that someone else survived. > > Thanking everyone in advance, > > Teri > > > > ==== IACEDAR Mailing List ==== > Diana Muir - List Owner and Moderator irishgenie@hotmail.com > http://www.rootsweb.com/~genclass/index.html 8 Free Online Genealogy classes, free online CD Lookups, and Mother Hubbard's Cupboard > http://www.rootsweb.com/~iacedar/index.html Cedar County GenWeb Page > **************************************************************************** ********************************************************* >