Thomas Foster

aunt minerva collection
The Foster Family by W.T. Foster, cont.

My grand-father, third son of William was born on Muddy Creek, York county, Pa. November 12 1772. The discrepancy about some of the family having been born in Marylanad was caused by a dispute between Maryland and Pennsylvania over the boundary line but the settlement of that dispute leaves the old homestead in Pennsylvania. Our grand-father Thomas Foster was eleven years old when the family moved to Kentucky. He married Rachel Thomas who was Scotch-Irish of Welch ancestry. She was born in Philadelphia and the family moved to Kentucky. She was a blue-eyed Celt of the old Welch Celtic stock and one of the best women I ever knew. She was noted as an excellent cook and house keeper. When I was two to six years old my father's homestead joined grand-father's farm and it was my great delight to visit them. Grand-mother's coffee, sweetened with wild candied honey, was, to me, equal to "The nectar that Jupiter sips." Her table cloth, towels, and napkins were of the snow white linen and she had as keepsakes, some of the linen that had been brought from Londonderry 126 year before. My grand-mother, Rachel Thomas Foster was a model mother, wife and citizen whom I delight to honor as a king and loving woman and her goodness adds to the honors of our family.
My grand-father, Thomas Foster was six feet in height, weighted 180 pounds, grey-eyed, dark skin, very dark hair, and no grey hairs at the time of his death in 1855, when he was 83. His body was of the round form, not so square or erect as usual for Fosters, but not stoop-shouldered. He was powerful in a muscular way, a champion wrestler, knew how to defend himself, was not quarrelsome, and not addicted to drink. The Scotch-Irish all took an occasional drink of Kentucky whisky but drunkards among them were very few. Grand-father moved to Ohio in 1817 where he owned a good farm. I have heard him tell about selling that farm for a half bushel of silver dollars which he put into a mill sack and placed on a pack-horse, which he lead while he rode another horse. With this outfit he traveled from Ohio to Indiana where he bought another farm wtih that silver. His Ohio farm is now a part of Cincinnati.
My Foster grand-parents had six children. Elizabeth, John, Nancy, David Nelson, Rachel, and Thomas. They were all born in Harrison county, Kentucky and raised large families except Thomas, my father. Elizabeth , born 1796, married Ancil Terry; John married his second cousin Nelly Foster, grand-daughter of John Foster of North Carolina; Nancy married George Flint, a noted Christian preacher; David Nelson married a Bunyard. He was born in 1812, was six feet,two inches in height, grey-eyed, weighed 180 pounds, straight as an arrow and of great muscular strength. He died on the "Plains" in 1849, of cholera, while enroute to the gold mines of California. HE was much like William, his grand-father. Rachel married Thomas Flint, and their son, Thomas has aided me in this work. I have a letter from him giving details of the Flint Family history and some accounts of the Terry's and Selby's, which I have placed in a well bound scrap book of the Foster Family. The elder Thomas Flint was the first circuit court clerk of Harrision county,Missouri. George and Thomas Flint married the two Foster sisters, Nancy and Rachel. The Flints and Terrys are closely related to the Fosters and William Selby married Martha, daughter of Thomas Flint. William Selby was one of the best men I ever knew and seemed to be closer kin than only by marriage. Recently I have learned that Lord Selby, a member of Parliament and governor of Thornton military castle was a general in the Crusade wars about 600 years ago and that our ancestor, William Foster, governor of Bamborough, married his daughter, Dorothy. This makes Sir William Selby one of the ancestors of the Foster's and he was the ancestor for the Harrison county, Missouri, Selbys. Sir William Selby was knighted by the King of England for military deeds of honor and his coat of arms includes the picture of a Saracen, a lion and the fleur de lys. This proves him to have been a general in the Crusades and the French wars. The Terrys, also were generals in these wars and their coat of arms is the same as the Selbys.
King Henry II of England was son of a Normandy, France Count. Henry later went to France with an army and became King of France. His wife was a Princess of the line of Kings, Charles Martel, Pepin, Charlemagne and Charles II of France. That line of Kings were also ancestors of the Fosters. When Henry II took his army from England to France the Selbys and Terrys were among his generals and the fluer de lys in the Selby and Terry coats of arms comes from the coat of arms of Henry II. The Flints were also knighted by the King of England for military deeds of honor in the Crusade wars. I regard it as a matter of great importance that I discovered these four families were blood relatives as far back as 1066 A.D. The family history of the Fosters, Flints, Terrys and Selbys is-in a general way-the same, back to the prehistoric high lands of Asia. The Flints and Selbys are mixed more with the Saxons while the Fosters and Terrys are mixed more with the Welsh. I am sure that the Fosters, Flints, Selbys and Terrys were together in continental Europe 1,000 years ago in the Crusade wars, that they were all Norman-French and drifted westward together.
in 1841 my grand-father Foster and all his descendants, except the George Flint family, migrated from Indiana and Illinois to the Grand River County in Northwest Missouri. They came in thirteen covered wagons sometimes called prairie schooners, each drawn by two horses, besides a number who rode on horseback. That was a notable event and that 500 mile trip would make an interesting history. The George Flint family followed in 1842. There were about 42 of these Foster, Flint, Selby, Terry immigrants and they settled in what is now Daviess and Harrison county, Missouri. Each head of family took a claim of 160 acres of land for which they paid $200 and as the younger members reached sufficient age they too took similar land claims.
The prairie sod was so tough it was difficult to put it into cultivation and good water was difficult to find on the prairies. For those reasons the settlements were made near where the timber and prairie joined. My father had about 80 acres, each of good white oak timber and prairie. They cut prairie grass for hay, used wild meats altogether and cultivated Indian corn for bread. In 1841 and 1842, corn was worth one dollar a bushel.
All these immigrants were well fixed. Grand-father Foster had about $5,000 cash. We lived on that old homestead five years and I can remember many events that occurred in 1844-5-6-7. When hunting time came, father would hunt and trap from 4 to 6 days out of the week and it kept mother busy besides the housework, in patching father's clothing. PAtch upon patch was the rule and while he was out hunting she would mend the suit he had torn out the day before while running or walking through the brush. All kinds of game were plentiful; fur animals were numerous and valuable; turkeys and deer were abundant. The elk and buffalo had left a few years before but their horns were scattered all over the country. Mink, coon, otter, beaver, lynx, wild oat, bob cat, timber wolf, prairie wolf, were abundant and a few panthers were the terrors of the new settlers. WIld bees made all the wild honey the new settlers wanted and many trees had to all for their honey. (?fall? deb)