When my ancestors first arrived in the New World, much of the Dutch and British colonies were covered in forests. Over time, those forests were cleared for farmland—a pattern that continued as families pushed westward. Many of my lines ultimately converged in Barton County, Missouri, located on the eastern edge of the wide-open Osage Plains, part of the vast prairies of the American West. These prairies were characterized by tall grasses, with trees lining the many creeks and streams. The rich, loamy soil proved ideal for farming and attracted settlers from the Midwest and Upper South, especially in the years surrounding the Civil War.
The first of my ancestors to arrive in southwest Missouri were the Maddox and Curry families. Robert Curry (my 2nd-great-grandfather on my paternal side) married Elizabeth Ann Maddox, and by 1860 they were living in Montevallo Township, Vernon County—just north of Barton County. At that time, Vernon County’s population was only 4,850. Both families had deep roots in the East: the Maddoxes had lived in colonial Virginia, then migrated west through Tennessee; the Currys migrated through Kentucky from the east. They initially settled in Monroe County, Missouri, before 1840, then moved further west by 1850 in search of new farmland.
Unfortunately, they were caught up in the turmoil of the Civil War. The region was a hotbed of guerrilla warfare against Union forces. Being deeply Southern in sympathy, the extended Maddox family was aligned with the bushwhackers and suffered retaliation when Union troops struck back at towns that had supported the Confederacy. But that is another story.
Another transplanted Southern family on my paternal side was the Younts. Though the Younts originally arrived in Pennsylvania in the 1700s, they later established themselves in North Carolina and then in the Cape Girardeau region of Missouri in the early 1800s. Frederick Yount (my 2nd-great-grandfather) moved to Barton County with his second wife, Elizabeth, before 1870 and started a farm there. This was a blended family migration of Younts and Krimmingers—several of Elizabeth’s children also relocated and established themselves in Barton County. (Note: In the 1886 plat of Barton City shown above, nearby settlers included the Mayfields, relatives of Frederick Yount’s first wife. At least one was a 5th cousin. Even when families weren’t close, they were often distantly related and were part of the tight-knit web of early settlers.)
On my maternal side was Anthony Gilmartin, a Union Army veteran and 2nd-great-grandfather. He, his wife Jane, and their children migrated to Barton County between 1867 and 1870 from Illinois. Another Illinois transplant was John Jay Fast and his wife Hannah Robbins Day, my 3rd-great-grandparents, who arrived in 1866.
Another Union Army veteran, my great-grandfather David Cassatt, first moved to the prairies of Carroll County, Missouri, near the Missouri River. He later settled in Barton County in 1878. The Reed family also arrived during the 1870s, migrating from eastern Ohio under the leadership of S.D. Reed, my 2nd-great-grandfather.
Among the most notable of these settlers was Benjamin Cruiser McWilliams (my 2nd-great-grandfather), who not only moved to Barton County in the 1860s but also recorded his vivid impressions. As I’ve mentioned before, Ben was part Scots-Irish and part German from the Appalachian region of Pennsylvania, and the vast prairie made quite an impression on him. According to The History of Barton County, he:
...only remained here a short time, as the country was but a vast rolling prairie, with no houses or improved farms, and went to Dubuque, Iowa, thence to Cedar Rapids, and was married at Danforth, Johnson County, Iowa, to Miss Mary A. Cloud, on the 24th of December, 1867. In 1869 he returned to his farm in Missouri, at that time there being no house between his and the county seat, Lamar, sixteen miles away…
He further described his first impressions of the prairie in his own words:
I went around the next morning and [real estate agent George Walser] had his ponies hitched up to his ‘"buckboard," and we both got in and drove seventeen miles northwest of Lamar to the Round Mound in Barton City Township, where we commanded a good view of the surrounding country. The grass had all gone to seed that year and was as high as your head on all sides, resembling a vast sea.
Pointing from this point of view to a place to the southwest of where we stood, on the Round Mound, to land near the foot of the same said, "Now your land lies down there." [...]
Viewed from the top of this mound, the surrounding country was beautiful to behold and enough to captivate anyone, especially someone from the East, where mountains block the view. The broad plains stretched out on all sides and melted away into the horizon, with flocks of wild deer and antelope roaming freely. All other forms of game abounded—prairie chickens, wild turkey, and squirrels—in the timber. As far as the eye could reach, I found no settlements on this lone prairie, but the wild game held full sway. A few log cabins, however, dotted the creek banks as far to the east, near what was called Little Drywood, these were sheltered by trees.
To these east-coast migrants, the Missouri prairie truly was a land of wide-open spaces—a land of possibility. Barton County had just 1,817 residents in 1860. Though the region was a Civil War battleground, the promise of fertile land drew settlers westward, and by 1870 the population had grown to 4,285, and by 1880 to 10,332.
This post is only a summary of the settler ancestors in my family tree. As I’ve dug deeper into census records, agricultural schedules, and land deeds, more stories have come to light. Each deserves a post of its own.
These settlers formed farming and faith communities, and any map from 100+ years ago shows their farms scattered across various townships—but rarely far apart. Over time, these proximity-based relationships turned into marriages, as children who migrated or were born in Missouri grew up alongside one another.
Ben McWilliams recalled one such bond:
John Fast and family had located and settled in the north part of the city, near the present location of the waterworks tower. There were several trails which crossed his land, so he had laid rails across these trails to divert the travel from across his newly sowed wheat fields. Two sons, John and Marion, later went out and settled near Barton City, and became my lifelong neighbors and friends.
Ben’s daughter, Nellie, later married Marion’s son, Orin Taylor Fast—and together they became “Grandma and Grandpa Fast,” names that live on in many family tales.
Photo: 1886 Plat of Barton City Township; Courtesy of Cindy Cruz
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