A Raft Pilot's Log cont. Some of the Men Prominent in the Rafting Industry, 1840-1915 234 CAPTAIN CYPRIAN BUISSON There were four of the Buisson boys. Antoine, the second, only made a few trips on floating rafts, and then went in the Dakotas and took up farming. The other three, Henry, Joseph and Cyprian, stuck to the rafting game as long as it lasted, except that Henry enlisted in the Fifth Minnesota Infantry and served during the Civil War. Their grandfather was Lieutenant Duncan Graham who cammanded the small detachment of British troops that with their indian allies, defeated the United States force under Colonel Zachary Taylor at the battle of Credir Island near Davenport on September 5, 1814. Lieutenant Graham married an indian wife, probably of the sac tribe, and their daughter was born on or near Credit Island. Lieutenant Graham's duties took him to Minnesota for many years and this daughter married Joseph Buisson, a French Canadian trader, who was an early settler in Wabasha. Whether Mrs. Buisson, the mother of these four sons and three daughters, was a Sac or a Souix, is in doubt, but one thing is sure: she gad children of whom any mother could be justly proud. They all stood high in their old home town. Cyprian, the third son of Joseph Buisson, was born in Wabasha, Minnesota, September 25, 1849. His youth was spent mostly in learning and playing the games of the young Souix who were his chosen companions. He was fond of hunting and trapping and became very skillful in using a gun or a canoe and always had both with him on the 'B.Hershey.' Joseph, his next older brother, took more interest in school, but hard as he tried, he could not keep young Cyp at his studies when condition were favorable for 237 hunting or trapping. He told me Joe gave him many a licking for running away from school. But if Cyp did not learn much in school he leaned a lot outside. Perfectly at home in the woods, he knew more about animals, birds, fishes, flowers and plants than anyone I ever had the good fotune to know. When only sixteen he began his work on rafts, pulling an oar for David Craft on a lumber raft to Saint Louis. He quickly learned the river and began piloting himself. His first practice running a raft was when he and Jack Walker chartered the little 'Novelty' in the late sixties. Then he and his brother Joe went on the 'Clyde' for three seasons. In the spring of 1877 he came out as master and pilot of the fine, large, powerful raft-boat 'B. Hershey,' built at Kahlkes yard at Rock Islandfor the Hershey Lumber Company of Muscatine, Iowa. For twelve successive seasons he ran their logs from Beef Slough, West Newton and Stillwater, making a record that nobody could beat. Then the Valley Navigation Company was formed by Captain Cyprian, Joe and a few others. This company bought the 'B.Hershey' of the Hershey Lumber Company, the 'C.W.Cowley' of Fleming Brothers and the 'Lafayette Lamb' of C. Lamb and Sons and Cyp remained on the 'Hershey' for eight years more running logs for Hershey Lumber Company on contract, making twenty years of service on the one boat, clean, skillful, satisfactory service, all of it. Then he wanted a change and going to Dakota he tried farming six years, but the lure of the river brought him backand he put in a few seasons rafting, working government baots, had charge of the steamer 'Helen Blair' in the Davenport and Burlington trade, and 238 wound up his steamboating on the big side-wheeler 'Morning Star' in the Davenport, Saint Paul and stillwater trade, until the end of the season 1917, when ill health developed into serious and painful sickness terminating November 24, 1920. He was first married August 18, 1876 to Elizabeth Stone of Wabasha, who died November 17, 1906. In 1913 he married lillian Enber of Saint Paul who gave hon sonstant and loving care through his long illness and survives. There were no children by either marriage, but they adopted, raised and educated three children who needed homes and parents and were fortunate in having such care and guidance. Captain Cyp was a handsome man, very modest and gentle in speech and actiion but not afraid of anything or any person. A better pilot or more pleasant companion one could not find. he was the highest type of gentleman, whose memory we will always prize.