Local History: Pioneer Edom Shugart
- Terri
- Oct 3
- 12 min read
Pioneer Edom Shugart, the youngest in the Nathan Shugart family, was the first to conduct school classes in DeWitt County. After some time of moving from place to place, Edom decided to leave Iowa in 1852 and journey to Texas with his family. His travels, fraught with challenges from cholera and measles, are recorded in his journal, which includes some heart breaking entries.
Pioneer Edom Shugart
Edom was the youngest child born into the Nathan Shugart family in 1810. They lived in Grainger County, Tennessee, until his father sold his 50-acre parcel on 1 Dec 1817. This is when I think they came to Illinois, becoming some of our earliest settlers, arriving a year before statehood. We find Nathan and his family in the 1820 US Federal Census in the Fork Prairie district of Madison County, later to become Sangamon County. Nathan died in September of 1822, and by the time his estate went through probate, his widow Lucinda was left with essentially nothing. As we know, she and her sons Zion and Edom, along with Elisha and Mary Ann Butler, became the first non-native Americans to dwell within the current boundaries of DeWitt County in 1824. Many years after leaving DeWitt County, he wrote a letter to an old acquaintance in which he recalled an event from those early days. Then, of course, there was no general store or even a grist mill closer than 40 to 50 miles. In the spring of 1825, his older brother Zion sent him to fetch a bag of cornmeal – an overnight trip. On his way back to their cabin in the woods by Salt Creek, his horse was startled and threw Edom and the bag of cornmeal to the ground. Edom, who had not yet turned 16 and was a scrawny lad, tried as hard as he could but could not lift the heavy bag of cornmeal back onto the horse and had to return to the cabin with his tail between his legs and tell his brother what had happened. He then had to lead Zion to the spot where the bag fell so his brother could take care of it.
Edom is credited with holding the first school classes in DeWitt County – in fact, when the Future Teachers Club was formed at Clinton High School in 1948, it was called the “Edom Shugart Future Teachers of America.” He taught at a few different schools, but after he turned 21, he married Elizabeth “Betty” Troxel and soon bought some farm land in Texas Township. This didn’t seem to satisfy Edom for long, though. I couldn’t find him in the 1840 Census, but by 1844, he and his growing family are present in the Keokuk precinct of the Iowa Territory (two years before statehood). Then in 1850, he appears in Logan County, Illinois, now with seven children and another on the way. Again, he was apparently not satisfied, and he decided to join a group of mostly his wife’s relatives to set out for Texas, where they intended to create a new town in which Edom would start a school.
The Shugarts packed all their belongings and children in a wagon and traveled to Appanoose County, Iowa, to join the rest of the caravan. At this time, Edom was 42 years old, Betty was 35, and their children were 18, 16, 14, 12, one who turned 10 on the trip, 6, 4 and 21 months. Edom kept a journal of the trip, and he started by naming his fellow sojourners: Frederick B. Troxel (Betty’s brother) and his wife and 10 children, James Pike and his wife Mary (Betty’s sister) and their four children, Joshua and Sarah Brown Troxel (Betty’s brother and mother), James Clifton and his wife and four children (unknown relationship) and Bradley Rhodes, who did not appear to be related to anyone. They departed on 20 May 1852, from the homestead of Carter Troxel, another of Betty’s brothers, in Appanoose County along the southern edge of Iowa. Following are some highlights from Edom’s journal.
May 20 – Set off in a severe frost in the morning, enough to ice over still water like glass. That first day, they only made 12 miles, not quite reaching Missouri.
May 21 – Just 7 or eight miles gained, now into Putnam County, Missouri.
May 22 – James Pike coming down with measles. He and Frederick B. Troxel decided to discard some of their belongings to lighten their load. Took a wrong turn, but traveled 20 miles into Sullivan County.
May 23 – Only made about 16 miles, still in Sullivan County. Several men now showing symptoms of measles, including Edom.
May 24 – In the morning, James Pike’s mare was missing; seems she decided to return home. Edom’s son William tracked her down and brought her back. Only traveled 8 miles today.
May 25 – Hard rain in the morning left everybody soaked. James Pike’s family all quite sick. Traveled only a few miles, then set up camp in the early afternoon to dry out bedding.
May 26 – Another hard rain, but parties had stayed in their wagons rather than tents to stay dry. No travel today, as several are quite sick.
May 27 – Moved a few miles into Linn County. Those with measles very sick.
May 28 – Traveled 17 miles today, even though the roads were bad and the mud was sometimes up to the hubs on the wagon wheels. Camped on the bluff overlooking Yellow Creek in Chariton County.
May 29 – Arrive at Brunswick (Chariton County) in late evening. Pike and three of his children are very sick with measles, and they sent for a doctor. Edam is just about well again.
May 30 – Procured an empty house a half mile from Brunswick for the sick folk. Doctor Prosser attending them.
May 31 – Group ordered to leave the house, but they stayed. Necessary to sit up with the Pike children all night.
June 1 – Children still too weak to travel. Expenses “heavy but unavoidable.”
June 2 – Caravan forges ahead to a ferry and got across the Missouri River. Clifton family didn’t make it across yet. Rest of group encamped in a cottonwood grove ½ mile below the ferry to wait for Cliftons. Betty Shugart coming down with measles. Now in Saline County.
June 3 – Cliftons caught up with the others, traveled 15 miles in wet weather. Several children sick now.
June 4 – James Pike’s mare took off for home again, captured 5-6 miles back. Good roads today, reached Marshall, seat of Saline County, and got on the road to Georgetown (now Sedalia), seat of Pettis County. Set up camp about 7 miles beyond Marshall. Pike’s son John (about 3) hit with severe diarrhea, and “the measles are giving us considerable amusement.”
June 5 – After getting lost twice, made it to Pettis County.
June 6 – Wagon repairs first thing in the morning. Made it to Georgetown at 3 pm. Steady rain from 2 pm to 5 pm, then a complete deluge. About half the travelers could fit in the wagons for the night, the rest had to pitch tents in the pouring rain with no chance to build a campfire. Between Edom Shugart’s family and Frederick Troxel’s family, 12 had broken out with measles, and “if they all get well it will be a wonder.”
June 7 – Little John Pike still sick, now Bradley Rhodes sick with diarrhea, too. Traveled only about 4 miles, then stopped to dry out clothes and bedding, but after an hour, it started raining again for several hours. No more travel.
June 8 – Weather cleared, but Clifton’s horses were missing, creating a delay. “Little John is no better and Bradley Rhodes has a very severe attack of diarrhaea and vomiting. We are very uneasy about him and their case is truly alarming, it has run into cholera morbus or we may almost safely say cholera, as he has a severe diarrhaea and vomiting attended with coldness and cramping of the hands and feet, his pulse has entirely sunk, he has turned purple around the eyes and his eyes appear to be sunk in his head and all his vital powers are prostrated now these are the symtoms you may call the disease what you please.” They pitched their tents in the yard of an abandoned building, but “little over an hour had elapsed after our arrival here when Little John Pike left his troubles in this world. Bradley Rhodes is no better, just alive and Clifton is very sick tonight and taking all these things in consideration this appears to be a dark period in the history of our travels.”
June 9 – “This morning is cool and clear early in the day we made arrangements to perform our last duties to the ramains of Little John. F.B. Troxel and E. Shugart made the coffin and Joshua and Fletcher Troxel and James Clifton went to dig the grave. They have to go back some three miles on the road to find a burrying ground where we laid his remains near the residence of William Bowen in Pettis Co. Missouri on the Spring fork of Flat Creek ten miles south of Georgetown. Clifton is better Fletcher Troxel was taken today with diarrhaea and Bradley Rhodes looks as if he must surely die in a short time. William Shugart and Mary Troxel are taking the measles.”
June 10 – Edom’s wife Betty Shugart was hit with vomiting and diarrhea around 2 am. The group sent for a doctor at daybreak, and a Dr. Killebrew responded to treat the ill. He confirmed that they were suffering from cholera and gave Betty a large dose of laudanum. The doctor stayed with them through the night.
June 11 – Dr. Killebrew left at dawn and returned in the afternoon. Despite his efforts, Betty’s brother Joshua (about 17 years of age) died at 3 pm, and at 9 pm, Betty “sank peacefully and quietly to rest having eight children to morn the loss of a kind and affectionate mother.”
June 12 – Three more died today: Bradley Rhodes (age unknown), Betty Troxel age 38 (Frederick’s wife), and Nicholas Pike, age 4. “Here is certainly a heart rending scene, seventeen children left motherless in the short space of twenty-four hours, and a sight truly shocking to humanity.”
June 13 – Edom left a clear description of the location of the graves they had just made. He wrote “Mother Troxel has kept up surprisingly well,” but I’m not sure if that was a reference to her health or to the fact that she had lost a son, daughter, daughter-in-law and two grandsons in the past two days. They employed a Dr. Karr, hoping he would have better luck than Dr. Killebrew.
June 14 – Edom’s son Frederick, under two years of age, started getting sick, and Dr. Karr gave him some medicine.
June 15 – Little Frederick and Little Sarah Pike are very sick, James Pike and Fletcher Troxel are doing better, but believe it or not, Pike’s mare died!
June 17 – Little Sarah Pike died at daybreak and was laid to rest beside her two brothers. Little Frederick seems improved, and James Pike and Fletcher Troxel are mending fast now.
June 18 – Edam, his son William and Frederick Troxel’s son Strawder went to purchase corn and meat. The coffin bills were paid ($10.20) and Dr. Karr’s fee paid ($20). They sent for Dr. Killebrew to come so he could be paid, but he never came, so they resolved to leave anyway.
June 21 – Group arrives in Benton County 30 miles from Warsaw and laid in a supply of bacon, sugar, coffee and tea to last some time. Frederick Troxel sold one of his horses for $40; his son Strawder alive but very sick and his daughter Delia not expected to live beyond the next 12 hours.
June 22 – Travel to Alexander’s Mill, eight miles from Warsaw. Little Delia, age 2, died at 10 pm.
June 23 – Little Delia buried near the mill in Benton County, 40 miles from her mother. Strawder better, Little Frederick worse.
June 24 – Traveled about 12 miles and camped near Quincy in Hickory County. Edom’s daughter Sarah (4) and Frederick’s daughter Sarah (3) now have cholera. The fathers bought some medicine called Hamilton’s Tonic Syrup of Blackberry hoping it would help their children.
June 25 – Edom’s son Frederick was “very low” and his son Robert (7) was hit suddenly and hard with the cholera. Dr. Alexander Blue, who lived near their camp, was summoned and he was able to improve Robert’s condition considerably.
June 26 – Little Frederick died at 8 am and was laid to rest near Dr. Blue’s residence.
June 28 – “F.B. Troxel's little Sarah is very low, we greatly fear she will have to stay with little Frederick. Oh it appears so hard to bear to drop our children off one by one in a strange country. If they could be laid by their mother we would feel much better satisfied.”
June 29 – Little Sarah Troxel died at 9 pm. Buried beside Little Frederick the next day.
July 2 – Moved a few miles to a new campsite, leaving Clifton family with the doctor for a few days. “We will remain here two or three days to wait for Clifton and as wood and water is plenty the women will do some washing.” At this point, there are only three women left, and one of them is Mrs. Clifton, who is with her family at the doctor’s.
July 4 – Cliftons rejoin the group, will resume travel tomorrow.
July 5 – Stopped at noon a few miles from Bolivar in Polk County, where Edom’s horse “took the colic.” Remainder of day spent trying to make the horse better.
July 6 – Edom used one of Clifton’s horses, and the boys led his sick horse, who dropped dead in about 300 yards. Around sunset, the group made camp by the Big Sac River in Greene County.
July 7 – Arrived just before sunset at Turnback Creek in Lawrence County.
July 8 – Crossed the Ozark Mountain on the Ozark Prairie to Spring River. “The Ozark where we crossed it is simply black rolling prarie, being the divide between the east and west waters, as the water on one side runs one way (eastward) and on the other side they run the other way (westward). We encamped tonight at a large cave spring owned by a man by the name of Druman.”
July 10 – Party arrives at Neosho, Newton County, and Edom runs into an old acquaintance to his ‘unutterable surprise.” But now Edom has no team and no money. ‘And here our journal will end for the present if possible we will have it continued when we again start for Texas.
Edom Shugart
Journalist”
Edom did make an addendum, lamenting the loss of his wife and son and the shattered dream of a better life in Texas. His last lines are a mix of hope and despair:
“I have undertaken to teach a three months subscription school. The undertaking appears to be a success as now Aug. 19th I am getting along very well with my children. Today F.B. Troxel and James Pike and James Clifton and Robert Blacker made another start for Texas leaving me and my children here, considering themselves fortunate (no doubt) in getting rid of us as we could not travel without being dependent on the company for our traveling expenses. And Betty was gone and as for the remainder of us they did not feel in the slightest degree interested. Well I will try and bear it all with as much patience and fortitude as I can. So here these reflections end. I may sometime become reconciled to my state - but never expect to be happy again. Edom Shugart.”
Edom eventually returned to Illinois, and he married again in 1856 in Tazewell County. The 1860 Census shows him, at age 50, a farmer living in Fulton County, living with his new wife, a son, Edom Jr., age 2, and three teenage step-children. Some of the children from his first marriage are adults. Sarah, age 12, is living with her married sister Lucy. Robert, age 14, is listed as a laborer living in the Cornelius Devore household in Tazewell County. Four sons, William, John, Bradley and James, would soon become Union Soldiers, all of whom survived the Civil War. Edom’s second wife died in February of 1870, and when the Census-taker comes around in June, Edom is living in his son William’s household in Tazewell County. His occupation is listed simply “at home,” though the Agricultural Schedule shows him owning 80 acres in neighboring Woodford County.
Apparently, Edom was still trying to find his destiny. At some point, he decided to go west, and he married a third time in Seward County, Nebraska, in 1874. By now, Edom was 64 years old and had, perhaps, decided to settle down for good. He died in 1897 at age 87, outliving six of his eleven children. At the time of his death, he had lived in the Tamora neighborhood for more than twenty years and was well known and highly regarded by his neighbors.
Sources
Ancestry.com
United States Federal Census
Iowa Territory Census
Nebraska State Census
Terri Lemmel was born and raised in DeWitt County near Kenney. Upon completing her education at Clinton High School, she lived in Bloomington for several years before returning to Clinton in 1990. Her interest in genealogy was piqued in the mid-90s when she found unidentified obituaries in her late grandmother's scrapbook that family members could not identify. While she initially dabbled in the subject, it wasn't until her retirement in 2018 that she jumped in with both feet. Terri joined the Genealogical Society and has been serving as its President since 2022. Research is a passion of hers, and there are lots of interesting stories to uncover! You can find Terri in the DeWitt County Genealogical Society room at the Vespasian Warner Public Library every Thursday completing research and helping others with their family and local history research.
To learn more about the DeWitt County Genealogical Society, feel free to reach out to them via phone at 217-935-5174, email at dewittcgs@gmail.com, their website, or their Facebook page.
The Vespasian Warner Library, located at 310 N. Quincy St. in Clinton, IL, features an extensive collection of local history and archives. To learn more, visit our Local History Page on the website or stop by in person! We are always excited to showcase our local history resources and discuss DeWitt County's local history.
