IMH 74:4 p330-31

"Chronicles of Upper Burnet" (1)

Saturday October 16th.

Father and Alvin put in at least part of the time on the cow stable. The Hand boys didn't get here till nine o'clock.
About 10.30 o'clock I started to town in the hack. Got to Uncle Rip's at just noon and ate dinner with them   W. R.
himself was not at home. I went up into Mr Shirley's office31 talked to him and Mr Henderson32 on politics awhile,
went to mill and got the meal (which was left yesterday), and about three o'clock started home. It had been blowing
hard from the south all day and had got very chilly. I was so chilled when I got home that I had no appetite and went
to bed where I soon got as well as I was before-apparently

Teaching Notes: Another Saturday and another trip to town. Often time the miller's fee for making meal or flour was
simply a percentage of the amount. In that manner , he had meal and flour to sell to those in town for their horses and, yes,
even their milk cows. Folks in town would sometimes hire a young person in the spring and summer to take their cow for
a grazing trip along the sides of a roads coming into town. They would graze the animals on one side and come back on
the other...no need to mow the roadsides!

Knowing that William Gregory will die within a year of the finishing of this journal, keeps one apprehensive about his
health..the phlegm in his throat etc. His brother Charles died a year before of "Consumption"...tuberculosis, a common
disease unfortunately and one that "consumed" you. I feel that Charles's death probably weighed heavily in the thoughts of
William although he seldom mentions it. Students might enjoy looking at the mortality record from 1850 in Morgan County.