Split Pea Soup

Canoe Manned by Voyageurs Passing a Waterfall (Ontario), 1869, by Frances Anne Hopkins.

Frenchmen in the Old Northwest (lands around the Great Lakes) had little opportunity to prepare a hot meal. Yet, men paddling and portaging canoes, bales of furs and supplies from dawn to dusk needed nutritious food. Here is one early recipe for a hot, satisfying stew that was enjoyed by the voyageurs.
The tin kettle in which we cooked our food, a trader wrote, would hold eight to ten gallons. At the end of a long day paddling our canoes, the cook hung our kettle over the fire, nearly full of water. Nine quarts of dried peas- one quart per man, the daily allowance - were added to the heating water. When the peas had all burst, two or three pounds of salt pork, cut into strips, where added for seasoning, and the kettle was allowed to simmer all night. At daybreak, the cook added four biscuits, broken up, to the mess, and invited all hands to breakfast.
The swelling of the peas and biscuits filled the kettle to the brim and was so thick that a stick would stand upright in the stew. The hungry Voyageurs squatted in a circle around the kettle. Each man used his wooden spoon to ladle the hot meal from the kettle to his mouth, with lightning speed, and soon filled their belly.
Pea Souper, a nickname for French-Canadians, originated because of this daily breakfast repast.

Rustic Shelters

On the frontier, it was common to build a rustic log cabin. A crew of lumbermen needed a bunkhouse close to where they were cutting old growth timber. A miner or trapper, merchant or farmer needed shelter when they moved into a new area. With a few tools and a little time, a rustic log cabin could be built. No nails were used in this structure as the log walls are interlocked and the shingled roof is held in place by an framework of saplings. Often the floor was dirt. As there is no fireplace in this rough structure, perhaps it was used as a storehouse. Over time, additional structures might be built such as a stable, barn, chicken house, spring house, smoke house. As the community grew, the settlers would raise a rustic log cabin church.

An Event from The French and Indian War

A few years ago, a woman from West Virginia ordered a cabin kit. She said the Franklin miniature log cabin looked much like the old cabin on her farm. She said her log cabin dated back to the French and Indian War. Her pioneer ancestors had built their log cabin home in a hollow, deep in the Appalachian mountains. While her family was carving their farm from the wilderness,France and England,Holland and Spain were again at war in Europe. The war (called the Seven Year War in Europe) soon spilled over into North America. British and Colonial troops started attacking French Canadian forts in the Ohio Valley. The French retaliated by sending war parties into New England and the South. On one of these raids, the woman told me, a war party came to her ancestors' cabin. The father was away on business. The indians quickly killed the hired hand and ransacked the cabin. The mother and her children (those old enough to travel) were taken captive and led off to Canada. The father, returning home a few hours later, learned what had happened.Swiftly, he recruited a few woodsmen and they tracked the war party north. When the mother and children arrived in Canada, a French family paid for their release and brought them into their home. The father, arriving in Canada, learned that his family was safe and sound. He gathered them up and led them back to their mountain home in West Virginia. Here, the family has continued to reside for over 250 years.