The flat-boats start for New Orleans—All hands appalled by the Mississippi’s flood—A good-for-nothing pilot—They try in vain to make a landing—Passing the “Devil’s Elbow”—Uncle Julius is “mighty scared”—The darky’s song—A sudden wreck, and a close call for Davy—The crew sit all night on the flood-trash of an island in the middle of the river—They are rescued by a steamboat and landed at Memphis—Davy finds a friend in Major Winchester—His return home.

The bears having taken to their winter hiding places—at least, those that Davy and his partners had not killed—there was nothing to keep back the work of splitting staves and completing the two boats. The latter were of the flat-bottom sort, strongly built of hewed timbers, and planks sawed in pits or upon scaffolds. They were caulked and pitched, and each had a well for the purpose of bailing water that leaked in. The decks were flat, with a small hatchway house over the entrance of the cabin below it. On board of a ship this would be called the companionway. The steering was done with a long sweep, or oar, at the stern, and sometimes with poles. Thirty thousand staves were put on board the two boats, and as soon as everything was ready a start was made.

The Deer and the Obion Rivers flow into the Mississippi at no great distance apart. Near the mouth of the Obion, a lake or bayou joins the channels, and this lake is thought by many to be the one upon whose shores the boats were built. As Davy was but a short time in getting his fleet out of the Obion and into the Mississippi, the lake must have been near the latter river. When they floated out into the Father of Waters, as the Indians call the great river, the venturous woodsmen were appalled by the immensity of the flood upon which they were borne swiftly along. Across the mile or more of yellow water that reached from shore to shore, bordered with leafless sycamores and cypress swamps, they saw new perils loom at every curve of the tortuous stream. The river flows at the rate of two hundred feet per minute, and as island after island, and bend after bend, had to be avoided or navigated with all the strength and watchfulness that was in them, it is not to be wondered at that, as Davy says, all the hands were “bad scared.”

Davy’s motto had always been to “go ahead,” but now he seems to have had no choice. He had never been down the river, probably never before had seen it, and the man hired as pilot was found to be a fraud. As the two boats were constantly either drifting apart or bumping into each other, they were lashed together, in the hope that in that way they might be more manageable.

Towards night they fell in with some boats from the Ohio, and when Davy wanted to make a landing, and tried without success to stop at the river’s banks, the Ohio boatmen shouted to him to keep on and run all night. He didn’t want then to “go ahead,” but there was no other way. The clumsy craft were always trying to butt into trouble. Sawyers, and planters, and sand-bars, and right-about curves of the channel, were forcing the crew to superhuman exertions, partly because they trusted to main strength without skill. Soon after they gave up trying to land, they came to a place called “The Devil’s Elbow.” Here Davy says he had the hardest work of his life. He twice attempted to land at Wood-yards, but could not. The people on shore tried to guide them with lights, and shouted to direct their efforts, but the boats were too heavy to manage, and finally the exhausted crew gave up the fight, and let the river sweep them along at will.

Davy was sitting by the stove in the cabin of one of the boats, thinking of what a “hobble” he had got himself into, and how much better bear-hunting was than being on the water, where he had to go ahead, whether he wanted to or not, when he heard some one walking slowly back and forth on the deck above him, and he went up the companionway to see who it was. The boats were sweeping along through the dark, and, in spite of attempts to steer, the crew were really trusting to a merciful Providence. The uneasy mortal for whom Davy was looking proved to be Uncle Julius, the darky cook.

“What’s the matter, Uncle?” Davy said. “Can’t you sleep?”

“’Deed I can’t, Mars Davy,” was the doleful reply. “De squinch-owls an’ de hoot-owls makin’ a heap er noise on de sho’, an’ de wolves is howlin’ like de ha’nts bin after ’um. ’Pears like I’s so oneasy I can’t keep still fer thinkin’ er de time w’en de crawfishes bo’ed de holes in de groun’, en all de animiles an’ de folkses, ’ceppin Noer en his critters, went down ter de bottom, kerblunkity-blink. I ain’ much fer whimplin’ erroun’, but I’s mighty juberous ’bout dis yere kin’ er sailin’, and wen you says I can’t sleep, Mars Dave, yo’ sho’s knockin’ at de back do’.”

Davy said a word to cheer up the old darky, then looked about him before going below. The ripple of the water against the sides of the boats was like the wash of waves on an unknown coast. From the tall buttonwood and cottonwood trees upon the shore came the “Hoo! Hoo! Too Whoo! Hoo! Hoo! Too Whoo!” that stirred the superstition of the darky’s nature. The tremulous cry of the ’coon, the howling of a wolf, and the bay of a hound, floated out across the muddy stream; then there came a sudden splashing of the water ahead, and a flock of ducks flew away with loud and angry clamor. From overhead the wild-geese call was like the far-away blast of a trumpet blown by spirits of the air. The wind was chill, and there was nothing a bear-hunter could do, so Davy went below again, but not to sleep.

The darky was trying to keep up his spirits by singing, the words of his ditty being somewhat similar to those made famous by Uncle Remus:

Davy most profoundly wished for the daylight the old cook was praying for. Suddenly there was a crash and the covering of the way to the deck was crushed flat, perhaps from being struck by the limbs of a tree. There was no chance to get out of the place where he was sitting. The scurrying of feet sounded above, there was a sudden thump and a tipping of the boat, as the clumsy craft struck the head of an island and lodged against a pile of flood-trash and loose timbers.

Realizing his danger, Davy tried in vain to force his way up the stairs. As the boat careened, the opening used for dipping water from the river was exposed, the other boat having drifted away. He tried to get out through this, but found it too small. In desperation he put his arms through as far as he could, and as the water was not yet up to his face, he says he “hollered as loud as he could roar,” telling the crew to pull him out or pull him in two. It was a case of life or death, with no time to wait. By a violent pull, they dragged him through. He had been without a coat in the cabin, and now found himself without a shirt, and so badly scratched up that he was “skinned like a rabbit.” He says he was glad enough to escape alive, without shirt or hide. The whole crew then left the boats to their fate and climbed onto the timber, which seems to have been in the form of a raft, where they sat without much on till morning. Davy had at this time a hope of success in the next election, and as he sat, disconsolate and barefooted in the middle of the Mississippi, two miles wide, he says:

“I reckon I looked like a pretty cracklin’ ever to get to Congress.”

In the midst of so many troubles, Davy showed his grit; and his reflections at the time are worth recording:

“We had now lost all our loading, and every particle of our clothing, except what we had on; but over all this, while I was setting there, in the night, floating about on the drift, I felt happier and better off than I had ever felt before in my life, for I had just made such a marvelous escape that I had forgot almost everything but that; and so I felt prime.”

About daylight a steamboat was seen coming down the river, and they flew such signals of distress as the state of their wardrobes allowed. It is traditional that one of the men stripped off his red shirt and waved it on the end of a cane pole that had caught in the flood-trash. A cheery blast from the boat’s whistle answered the signals, and as she stopped above them, a skiff was seen leaving her side. In a short time all were taken on board the rescuing craft, whose name is not known. She landed them at Memphis, without shoes or hats or any other articles of wearing apparel in sufficiency for half the crew. As they were passing one of the gambling rooms with which Memphis abounded in those days, some one hailed Davy, calling him Colonel Crockett. It proved to be one of the men who had been at the Talladega fight. Davy’s old comrade induced him to go with him to the store of Major Winchester, a wealthy trader. Davy was as proud a mortal as ever drew breath, but with a heart full of gratitude he accepted the Major’s offer of money and clothing for himself and the destitute crew. For this the Major would take nothing as security, not even a note or receipt, and his kindness and his faith in the Colonel never were forgotten.

From Memphis Davy went down the river to Natchez by steamboat, hoping to recover the boats in case they had held together. He heard of one of them fifty miles below Memphis, where attempts had been made to stop it, but, he says, “she was as hard-headed as ever.” Nothing was afterwards known of the other. So ended another of Davy’s ventures, and again he went home with empty hands to the little cabin at the end of the trail through the Obion wilderness.

In this lone clearing, he was literally “the man from the cane,” but he had no idea of staying there. He hunted bears, and planted his crops, and waited his time. When this had come, he again “offered” for Congress, and started upon an electioneering tour. His trip in which the boats were lost was in the year 1826, probably late in the fall. The Congressional campaign occurred in 1827, and the election was in August of that year. Some of the incidents of the canvass by Davy will be told in the next chapter.