p49 1817 Journal Thomas Dean

than one pound of meat put up. We took three guns and an ax, started about 10 A. M., and our guide went on with i us. The weather was very warm, and we had to go through the prairie, about seventy-two miles, which was very hot and uncomfortable. We could get no water to drink until we went about thirteen miles, where there was good water and a family lived. Here they gave us some milk to drink. After we had refreshed ourselves we left two gims and proceeded on. We traveled very fast until we came to Raccoon Creek, a large stream that runs into the Wabash twelve or nfteen miles above the fort. It was deep. Our guide went across and got a bark in the form of a canoe, took packs across, and Jacob Dick rode his horse across; the others waded. It was near up to their arms. I got some wet, as well as the rest, and it was very warm. We went on in our little path through the woods up the creek three or four miles, made a tire, and lay on the ground. Being very sweaty, and having no shelter, I took cold. We ate a piece of meat and laid down.

August Zd. We took a piece of bread and a small piece of meat for breakfast. It thundered, and as we went on in the little path it soon began to rain. I was very sore and stiff, so that I could hardly travel. It rained very hard, which made it worse going, and being wet with sweat all night, and now wet with rain, I was very uncomfortable. We went on some miles and stopped under the trees to rest, then went on again until fatigued, then stopped and made a shelter of bark and built a nre. Our guide would not wait for us, so we let him go on. It was so bad going through weeds and brush that we stayed about one hour