Pekin Daily Times
As the sound of hoof beats and the baying of hounds on the rural road heralds the approach of a posse, the farmer urgently ushers the group of fugitives through a trap door. When the fleeing family is safely sequestered, the farmer’s wife covers the trap door with a buffalo-skin rug and places their infant son’s crib atop the rug. The farmer lights a cigar to befuddle the hounds while his wife scolds the arriving posse for waking the baby.
The event described above holds a personal significance for Pamela Senkler, who has been working to preserve her family’s history.
In the early morning of Jan. 16, 1848, Albert Greene of the Mount Hope settlement in McLean County was celebrating his sixth birthday by battling a case of the measles. Feverish and restless, he thrashed and sweated his way into a semi-sleep when unusual activity in the house’s kitchen jolted him fully awake. He heard hushed conversation and the shuffling of many feet, and he smelled coffee brewing and meat frying.
Greene was awakened to hear the sound of wheels outside his home’s front door. He heard people passing back and forth between the house and the covered wagon that had pulled up. Then the wagon pulled away and the house was silent again.
In the early morning of Jan. 16, 1848, Albert Greene of the Mount Hope settlement in McLean County was celebrating his sixth birthday by battling a case of the measles.