Three Rivers
Hudson~Mohawk~Schoharie
History From America's Most Famous Valleys

The Life and Adventures
of Nat Foster,
Trapper and Hunter of the Adirondacks
by A. L. Byron-Curtiss
Utica, N. Y.
Press of Thomas J. Griffiths,
131 Genesee Street, 1897

Chapter IX

At the age of twenty three or four (his exact age we are unable to ascertain) Nat followed the example of his brother Elisha and "committed matrimony." The young woman he selected for his partner in life was Jemima Streeter, daughter of one Amos Streeter. Jeptha R. Simms, in a short sketch of the life of our hero in his book, "Trappers of New York," copyrighted in 1850, makes the statement that Miss Jemima was a New Hampshire lass; but we are authoritatively informed by her descendants of Foster, that she was a New York girl, and that she came from St. Lawrence county, her father being a justice of that county. The details of Nat's courtship and marriage are very meager, so meager in fact, that I have none at all, but as their event in its generalities is the same in the life of any man, be he prince or pauper, we can well afford to pass over this feature of his life and meet him again as he is settled on his own farm at Salisbury, Herkimer county, New York.

In person he was, as I have mentioned, about six feet tall, erect and strongly built, possessing a muscular frame that seemed well adapted for enduring the fatigues of the chase. His features were commanding, though not handsome. His eyes were blue and had a merry twinkle. Long before his face would relax into a smile, his expressive eyes would tell of the approaching manifestation of pleasure. This pleasant peculiarity he retained all through his life.

The country around his new home at Salisbury was mostly a wilderness and alive with game. Indeed, one of the chief reasons, we may believe, for his leaving the associations of his relation, and with his young wife seeking a new home farther in the wilderness, was that he might follow with greater success his favorite avocation, hunting and trapping.

From the time he settled at Salisbury, until the tragedy at the Old Forge in his old age, he followed the fortunes of a hunter with marked success. In justice to him I must state that all through his long career he never neglected his farm at Salisbury. In a few years after his settlement there he possessed a farm of one hundred and fifty acres, which received his careful attention. He grew annually good sized crops of grain. Wheat, buckwheat, rye and oats being among the cereals he raised. He would always sell his surplus grain at a reasonable figure, paying no attention to the market prices for these commodities, though always posted on the marketable value of furs and pelts. Very often, I am told, when the prices of grain were high, and the winters severe, he would load a sleigh with bags of grain, and going about the surrounding country, give a couple of bags to every poor family whose home he passed, and in the spring any one could get seeding from him for nothing, if he had it to spare.

For a long time he conducted an "ashery" for the making of potash in connection with his farming, employing men to collect the ashes and do the work for him. Wood being the only fuel of the time, wood ashes were plentiful and easily obtained. From them was made the potash referred to. The ashes were put in leaches, simply old barrels or boxes with troughs underneath; water was then filtered through them which; after soaking through the ashes, ran from the troughs a strong lye. The lye thus obtained was then boiled down and poured into pot shaped molds, from whence the name potash was obtained. These crystals were then shipped to Albany, where the material was manufactured into pearl ash and soda ash. He also had a large fish pond on his farm where he kept trout that he might always be able to give his friends a treat when they visited him by serving fresh trout at some meal.

I mention these various facts connected with his farm to show that he was an industrious, benevolent citizen, and in no sense a shiftless, indolent hunter and trapper. His excursions into the woods every autumn and winter for hunting and trapping were matters of business fully as much as pleasure for him. For thirty years he thus lived at Salisbury, leading the life of a hunter, trapper and farmer. He raised a large family of children, for whom he provided carefully and conscientiously.

When he settled at Salisbury he could neither read nor write. But some time after his settlement there, one of the storekeepers of the village taught him to write his name, and from this accomplishment he branched out into arithmetic and reading, mastering the rudiments of both, with the help of the storekeeper and his wife.

In a year or two after he settled at Salisbury, his father and brother Elisha moved from the east and settled with their families in the same town, so that Nat took up his hunting again with Elisha, though it does not appear that they companioned in this pursuit as much as before; but his youngest brothers, Elihu and Shubael, very frequently accompanied him in his hunting and trapping excursions deep into the forests.

At the time Nat emigrated to Herkimer county, game was so abundant that with his fondness for the sport, together with the inducements offered for hunting by the bounties paid for wolves, black bears and panthers, his pursuit of game was a source of great profit. He began his pioneer residence in the winter and by spring had had taken enough fur, mostly beaver, I am told, to purchase a cow and many articles necessary to housekeeping and farming. He afterwards obtained yearly large quantities of valuable fur, such as beaver, otter, martin, fisher and muskrat. It was nothing for him to have several hundred traps set in a single season during the years when he was in his prime and the game abundant. He of course, employed men to assist him in such stupendous work, paying them good wages, and having a fair margin left for his own profit. Deer, bears, wolves and panthers were so numerous about Salisbury for years after he made his home on the borders of the woods, that he slaughtered them in great numbers. It is believed to be justly said that he killed more of these animal collectively than any other white man in the state, having slain no less than seventy-five deer in one season and ninety-six bears in three seasons. Wolves he killed and trapped in large numbers. One season, when the bounty of them was high, he had two lines of wolf traps extending from Salisbury into the very heart of the Adirondacks; some say it extended clear through the wilderness to the St. Lawrence river. This is not improbable, considering his general extensive operations, and the fact that some of the adventures he had, which we will note, occurred in the county of St. Lawrence.

The avails of his hunting and trapping amounted one season, when a liberal bounty was paid on wolves, bears, and panthers, and he had taken an unusual number of furs of the other animals, to twelve hundred dollars, which he had in gold in the spring after he had closed up all of his sales and accounts. This was a vast sum for those days.

The bounties paid for the destruction of wild animals often made the town taxes something of a burden. One year a quite wealthy farmer took a stand at the town meeting against paying so large a bounty as was then paid, and succeeded in securing a large reduction in the prices paid by the officers for bears' tails, wolves' heads and panthers' ears. At this all the hunters of the township turned their attention to other game and purposely let the wolves and panthers alone. In a year's time they had greatly increased, the wolves particularly coming from the interior of the wilderness in great numbers attracted to the settlements by the toothsome, and now more easily obtained sheep. Foster had told his wealthy neighbor that he would be sorry for the manner in which he had worked and voted at the town meeting. And after the animals had had time to increase, he was not surprised one day to be told a most pitiful story by the same farmer, of the injuries and loss he had sustained the night before by wolves, which had gotten into his sheep fold and destroyed more property than his tax had amounted to when the bounty of wolf scalps was the highest. But the farmer found he was "barking up the wrong tree" when he told his tale to Foster, for after listening to him a moment he interrupted him by saying, "Well, I don't know as I can pity you. If you are not willing to pay me for protecting your sheep, you must buy traps and take care of them yourself." The penurious farmer saw the point; and it is needless to say was ready to vote a more liberal bounty than ever at the next town meeting.

The winter that the bounty was off the wild animals of a destructive nature, Foster turned his attention entirely to the killing of deer and moose, disposing of many of their carcasses in the eastern market. There may be seen now in Albany, New York and Philadelphia museums, mounted specimens of noble deer and moose killed by this famous hunter. He at one time had a captive moose on his farm at Salisbury, keeping it stalled in his barn.

Foster for a time carried a rifle called a "double shooter," made after a pattern designed by a gunsmith of the village, named Willis Avery, whose descendants still live in the village. The guns were made with single barrels, but with two locks, one above the other, and far enough apart to admit of two charges, the upper charge of powder resting against the lower bullet. The locks were made for percussion pills, and when the pick was down which crushed the pill at the upper lock, there was no danger to be apprehended in firing the other charge. In practical use, however, it was found that the vents would become plugged with a few firings, and they would have to be patiently picked open with a pin. So that the guns, which were really very ingenious, and would have answered admirable if percussion caps had been known, never came into general use. The rifle which Foster used most of his life would carry two balls as well as one. It was made expressly for him by Mr. Avery, and was light at the muzzle and heavy at the breech. This, Foster explained, was for the purpose of shooting game on the move. When he wished to make game doubly sure he would load with two bullets. It was in this manner he loaded it when he shot the Indian at the Old Forge.

He was remarkably expert at loading and firing his rifle. Particularly so if it was necessary to make several shots in hot haste and at short range. He was frequently known upon a wager to commence with his rifle unloaded and fire it off six times in one minute. The seems almost incredible, but nevertheless it is true. And we better understand it when we are told how he carried his bullets and loaded and fired on such occasions. He would place three well pared balls between the fingers of each hand; then from a powder horn provided with a charger, he would pour in the powder, drop in a ball which would just roll down the barrel without a patch, strike the butt of the gun with his hand, which primed it, and the next instant the bullet was speeding to its mark. Of course, this could be done only in firing at short range. To make long shots, it was necessary to patch the balls and drive them home with a ramrod. A flintlock rifle, of course, was used. His large bony hand aided him in retaining bullets between his fingers and as he began early to thus carry them, they formed for themselves cavities, the tissues of his fingers forming itself into almost the exact shape of a bullet mold, which nearly concealed the lead between his fingers. He was able to manipulate his gun, handle his knife or an ax without removing them. An ordinary observer, even in shaking hands with him, would not have noticed the strange jewelry he wore.

"A regiment of such riflemen as Foster firing at close range," says Simms in his book, "would soon decide the fate of a battle." Which was quite true for those days.

In the second American was with Great Britain, the following incident is related of Foster by his youngest brother, Shubael: "A company of riflemen from South Carolina, commanded by Captain Forsyth, passed through the town of Salisbury, near Diamond Hill, two miles north of Salisbury Corners. The troops were on their way from the Mohawk Valley to the military lines between New York and Canada. They encamped at Manheim over one day for the purpose of washing their clothes. The celebrity of Foster as a rapid shooter and accurate marksman came to the ears of Captain Forsyth, and he sent for Foster and questioned him in regard to his ability to fulfill all the extraordinary stories told by his friends about him. Foster did not have much to say, merely telling the captain that he would wager that he could "put more balls into the bigness of a man in the space of one minute than any one in his command." Now, Captain Forsyth had in his company a most expert and rapid rifleman named Robinson, and so he immediately took Foster at his word and arranged to have him pitted against his crack marksman. The terms of the wager were agreed upon and the manner of the test settled. They were to shoot six times at targets ten rods away, each beginning with unloaded rifle at the same time. They took their places, with the company drawn up in line to witness, as they supposed the defeat of the lank and uncouth trapper. Foster had his six well pared rifle balls between his fingers, which were unobserved.

"The signal was given and they began. Foster made things hum for a minute, while he poured the powder from his horn into the gun, mysteriously spread his fingers over the muzzle of his rifle, knocked the butt gently on the palm of his hand, and blazed away at his target, always putting a ball there, though were it came from none could imagine. He put the sixth ball in his target, having made a little circle of six holes in the piece of bark, while Robinson was still fumbling in his bullet pouch for his fourth bullet. A murmur of applause ran through the ranks, and Foster was at once a lion in the camp. Captain Forsyth was greatly surprised at finding so skillful and rapid a marksman on the frontier of New York, and anxious to secure his service, he offered him thirty dollars a month to join his company with the complimentary assurance that he might eat at his table. But as the war was regarded as nearly over, and Foster in common with many men of the interior, did not approve of the war anyway, he declined the offer."

Foster was sometimes accompanied by another hunter in his excursions into the woods. Occasionally he would devote a season to the business in partnership with another, at the end dividing the spoils or the proceeds of their sale. Stoner, who was a warm friend of Foster's from the time of his gallant conduct at St. Johnsville on the Fourth of July, sometimes visited him at Salisbury and accompanied him on his hunts. But more often than not he treaded the trackless forests alone.

His accouterments for a long journey, like going to the Fulton Chain or the most northern lakes, were quite numerous. Slung from his left shoulder and hanging at this right side would be a large powder horn and bullet pouch of sufficient dimensions to warrant a lengthy hunt. A belt encircled his waist, through which was thrust a sheathed knife with keen edge, and an ax or hatchet. When on jaunts for trapping, a bundle of small steel traps would also be suspended from his right shoulder. To his back was strapped his pack basket, containing his blanket, perhaps some more traps, a tin teapot, and sheet iron frying pan, a supply of tea, salt, Indian meal, and in the early part of the trip some bread.

When tramping through the forests he could make his camp in thirty minutes, with the snow even a foot deep. He would set up two crotched sticks, stretch a pole across them, and others from this to the ground, then covering the whole with hemlock boughs, and closing the sides with the same and strewing a liberal supply of twigs on the ground or snow, as the case might be, a good shelter was provided for his night's repose. According to the expression of an old guide, whom I interviewed, and who remembers Foster, the roof of such a hut properly thatched with hemlock boughs to the depth of six or eight inches, "Would shed all the water that ever fell in Noah's flood."

It might not be as watertight as that, but I have no doubt that it would shed all the water that fell in the hardest kind of a thunder shower. Building a huge fire before the open front of the shanty, Foster would spread his blanket on the fragrant boughs, and rolling himself therein, would sleep soundly until morning, or until awakened by the howl or bark of wild animals.

He never carried a compass with him in the woods, yet he was never lost, being always able to readily locate the directions by observing the tops of some nearby hemlock tree. He maintained that the small tapering top of these trees always grew with a slight bending towards the east, caused by the western winds; so he had only to look to the top of one of these trees of the forest and then go confidently on his way. If one of these trees was not in view, as sometimes might happen, then he studied the bark of any tree, even the drifting of the snow in winter afforded him means of guidance.

As he grew older and his reputation as a hunter and trapper increased, his kind and genial manner, which he coupled with all of his exploits, won for him the title of "Uncle Nat." And by this name he was called by people far and near, by those who knew him personally and by those who knew him by reputation only. His fame for shooting was increased in his younger days by his once delivering two girls from the attack of a panther. They were out in the woods in the vicinity of Salisbury, gathering flowers. Accompanying them was a large Newfoundland dog, named Towser. As they were strolling along, with Towser ahead, they saw what they supposed was another dog of a different kind, come out of the brush and commence to play and gambol with Towser. He, however, was not inclined to play as was the strange dog, but instead commenced to growl and show his teeth and finally ended the sport by seizing the stranger by the throat and shaking the life out of him.

The girls watched the struggle with interest, and when Towser threw the vanquished animal from him they clapped their hands in applause. But their pleasure was soon turned to fear, for Towser had scarcely turned to trot back tot he girls to be petted by them for his success, when another of the same kind of brutes, only much larger, sprang from the brush and attacked the god. It was an uneven struggle, and though poor Towser made an gallant fight, he soon began to weaken. The oldes girl now divined the true nature of the animal their dog was struggling with. It was a fierce and ugly panther, and it was her young one Towser had slain. This she did not dare to tell her companion for fear she would scream and, perhaps, faint, leaving them both entirely at the mercy of the wild beast.

In silence they watched the battle between their faithful canine friend and the huge yellow cat. Towser fought fearlessly and gave the panther a hard tussle before he was vanquished. At last the panther gained the mastery, and securing a hold on the dog's throat, dealt with him as its own kitten had been dealt with but a moment before. Then crouching over the body of the poor dog, it fastened its devilish eyes on the now terrified girls. By this time the youngest girl had also guessed the true nature of the animal that was struggling with their dog. And as she saw the struggle between them cease, and Towser dead, with the panther preparing to spring on them, she uttered a scream and fell fainting into the arms of her companion.

This brave girl who had witnessed the struggle with so much fortitude, now gave herself and her fainting friend up as lost. Supporting her prostrate companion, she bowed her head and waited the spring of the awful beast. But the scream the fainting girl had uttered was their salvation. Foster was in the vicinity, gun in hand, and hearing the agonized cry, hastened towards the spot from whence it came. He came in sight of the startling tableau of the huddling girls and crouching panther just as the latter was about to spring. Quick as a flash he raised his rifle, and observing that the head of the oldes girl covered the sight of the rifle, he uttered a warning "hist" and gently told her to lower he head. The girl heard and heeded,. she suffered her head to sink upon her breast, and the next instant Foster's rifle spoke their deliverance. He had put the ball squarely between the panther's eyes and it dropped dead upon the body of the dog it had slain.

No doubt my readers will recognize this story. Where have you seen it? In Cooper's Leatherstocking Tales. This incident in the life of Foster, it appears, the famous novelist has woven into the fabric of his thrilling adventures of Leatherstocking. But I believe this is the only incident in Foster's life that can be discovered in Cooper's works. In a foot note in the book "The Deerslayer," this incident is credited to Otsego county. But Foster's family say that it occurred in Herkimer county, and near Salisbury. Simms in his book called Foster "the modern Leatherstocking." He seemed ignorant of the fact that in a sense he was the Leatherstocking of Cooper. And indeed, I have every reason to believe that Foster was the identical character used by Cooper in his "Leatherstocking Tales." One of his descendants made this assertion to me, which I was at first inclined to discredit. But from the similarity of the two characters, I unintentionally obtained in gathering the facts of Foster's life, I became convinced that Nat Foster is Cooper's "Natty Bumfo." I am not alone in this opinion. The late Judge Hurlbut, who defended Foster at his trial for killing the Indian at the Old Forge, and who had known foster for years, was of this opinion. His son, Gansevort de W. Hurlbut of Albany, NY, is also of the same opinion, based upon statements of his father, and his own comparison of the tow characters. In a letter to me bearing on this subject, Mr. Hurtlbut says: "James Fennimore Cooper having known Foster in his lifetime (at an early age) it seems not improbable that he took Foster as the original of his famous scout and trapper, commonly called 'Leatherstocking,' or in other words, that 'Nat Foster' and 'Natty Bumfo' were identical. Observe the similarity in description, of manners, habits and person. Dread of the law, and consequent outward conformity; their laughing in an exactly similar manner, without noise; mouth the same; the style of rifle carried by both; both leaving the state; * * * * and then through it all, you find points of similarity, hardly the work of chance. After the comparison of the Leatherstocking in the 'Pioneers,' and the 'Deerslayer' with the character of Foster described by Simms, and there is additional ground for the assertion that they are the same person; or rather, that Cooper's hero was none other than Nat Foster." This is the statement of a man who knows whereof he speaks. If my work amounts to nothing more, I will be satisfied, if it develops into a biography of the man who afforded the inspiration to Cooper to write those thrilling and fascinating "Leatherstocking Tales," which have delighted and entertained so many of us from our youth, even until now.

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