Pioneer history of Ingham County, compiled and arranged by Mrs. Franc L. Adams, secretary of the Ingham County pioneer and historical society.

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PIONEER HISTORY OF INGIIAM COUNTY

A STORY OF PIONEER LIFE.
Told by HARLOW V. TALLMAN.
In 1844 my father, Timothy Tallman, and my mother, Marie
Tallman, left the township of Byron, Genesee county, N. Y., and
started for the wilds of Michigan. My father being a cooper. he
made some large barrels to pack their household goods in; no
chairs, no bedsteads, no tables, no stands of any kind.
We reached Jackson the last of October, where a man by the
name of Daggett met us to bring us to Eden, Ingham county.
He had an ox team and lumber wagon. We left Jackson just daylight and moved north, coming through Leslie and on to Eden.
We got within one mile of what was two years later known as
Hopkin's tavern. Mr. Daggett thought he could save a little
distance by cutting across lots, as it was then dark. My father
and two brothers commenced cutting down the underbrush, while
Mr. Daggett held the old one-candle lantern. My mother and my
sisters were on the load, while my youngest brother and myself
were in mother's lap. Our seat was a board on top of the barrels.
We kept on going until we found ourselves in a tamarack swamp,
and lost at that. Then the men folks set up a howl and what was
the result? A man by the name of William Kirby came in sight;
he had a lantern, one-candle power, a dog, ax and his gun, thinking someone had treed a bear. Mr. Kirby then took us to
his house for the rest of the night, and in the morning we had to
make backward over 100 rods to a log house owned by Zeb Eggleston. A one-room house, with no floor to speak of below. My
father and the older boys went to work and made some bedsteads
out of poles. We stayed there until 1845, then moved up on section 28, and there my father died leaving my mother with eleven
children, three little ones and four big ones to look after her in
Michigan, four having been left back in the East to care for themselves.
Ten years later my mother married a man by the name of John
Pierce; he had a big family, so we Tallman children had to shirk
for ourselves.
In 1854, just so sure as I am alive, a naughty wind came along
one day and it liked to have swept us all away. It was sure a