ADELINAH TAYLOR
Reported by Helen M. Smith, Field Reporter

2011. Transcriptionists note: The last page of this interview was microfilmed missing wording on the left border. While the story can be pieced together somewhat, it is the best available.

I was born in Spartanburg, South Carolina, in 1847. There were seven children in our family—six girls and one boy. I was the oldest girl and had a great deal of work to do on that account. I began sewing at five years of age, and got so much pleasure from it that I have kept it up ever since whenever possible. I completed my first quilt at just past six years. I spun and wove, made men’s shirts and pants and vests, as well as garments for women and children.

None of us were ever sick, and I didn’t know what a doctor was for until after my twelfth year. I might not have known then, but that one of my uncles was a doctor, and he visited us at that time.

My father, John Jackson Quinn, was an ardent Democrat, but as ardently against secession. When the Civil War broke out he was quite disgusted. I remember that soon after the war began, soldiers from Little Rock marched past our place. They overflowed the yard, drew water from the well until there was none left and we had not so much as a drop with which to quench our thirst, killed our chickens, and even a prize sow Father was keeping for a brood sow. One of the Guina-fowl flew up into a tall tree, and I can still see the soldiers trying to drive her down to make a meal for them. They didn’t get her, and we had one Guiana fowl to start with after they left. The worst of it was that of our fine sow they killed, they had used only a part of one ham, while the remaining meat was left on the ground. We found a nice beef, too, killed, but not so much as a skinning knife put to the carcass. Father was so disgusted that he determined then and there to get out of the likely war area.

We went into eastern Texas, returning after the close of the war. We settled again in the same locality. I was then about fifteen years old. Soon afte,r some Mormon missionaries came to our neighborhood, and many there were converted to their faith.
Our family, among others, returned with the missionaries to Arizona. This group traveled in covered wagons with ox-teams, and were six months on the way. We crossed the Mississippi River at Memphis, I recall. Soon after this crossing, after traversing low, sloughy land, we camped at another river whose name I have forgotten. There were fishermen camped below our camp at some small distance, and Father sent my brother down to their camp to see if he could buy some fish. They offered him an enormous fish weighing around seventy-five pounds, for which they wanted “two bits”. My brother had never before heard the expression, and returned all the way to camp to ask Father what was meant by “two bits”, and whether or not he should buy the fish. He bought it and it was delicious, making an excellent meal for the whole camp.

We cooked in Dutch ovens or on sticks in the ground beside the fire, depending upon what the food in question was like. Somewhere at the latter end of the trip, provisions ran low, and we were really hungry. There had been no game sighted for several days. Suddenly someone nudged me. Father had drawn a bead on a large jackrabbit. We all shut our eyes and drew ourselves up tensely, until a shout told us that Father had got the rabbit. Such a feast we had that night at the campfire, where the rabbit was boiled in a large pot, and dumplings added. It was the best food I have ever tasted.

It was somewhere near the end of our journey, too, that we came very close to being swept away by a flood. We had come to a very deep and wide wash, dry, of course. This was in the evening, and as soon as we had gone down the steep bank of the wash and across it, we made camp. The other side of the wash was not so steep, and we stopped in its shelter rather than to go on to the top. The evening meal was over, and all in the camp had long since gone to sleep, except for the guards, when there was a sudden loud ‘helloing’ from the top of our bank. Father started from the tent in alarm, as did the others, thinking we were attacked by Indians. Someone then shouted from the darkness above us that a flood was coming down the wash and for us to get out at once. We lost no time in hitching up the wagons and pulling out, and none too soon, for the wash was soon full of swiftly running water. We never discovered who had roused us in the middle of the night and warned us, for the person who had shouted from the bank was never seen by any of us.

We were almost the first settlers in what is now Safford. The Quinns and their relatives formed much of the wagon train, and since all settled nearby, we were related in some way to the whole settlement in the course of a few years. We were great on having family reunions in after years, and it was the custom of the schools to let all the Quinn children and their relatives out of school on such occasions. A new teacher related that, upon the first of such occasions she experienced, when she had requested all the Quinns to stand preparatory to excusing them, the whole school stood.

I was an expert seamstress and earned much of my way by sewing. For some time in Safford I made every wedding dress worn. I was also quite a good maternity nurse, and many is the case I have cared for there and elsewhere. I never refused any help I could give to poor, sick, or needy.

We had houses made of mud with roofs of branches of trees and covered with dirt. We cooked on fireplaces. I was beginning to get middle-aged before I ever saw meat in tin cans, and I still remember my amazement at the sight. We used a saucer of some sort of grease with a string in the grease, for light.

We had far more Indian scares in Safford than we had had on the way out. I never experienced anything of the sort personally, but in my part of nurse I often saw the results. There was a man in the community who had got himself in bad with the law in Mexico, and had left hastily. He worked hard after he reached our locality to earn money enough to have his wife and baby brought out of Mexico. When he had enough money, he had a friend and wife travel out to Safford with his wife and baby. This company camped at a water hole near Safford on their last night out. Indians attacked them at dawn, killing both women and the man. The baby was covered by the featherbed, no doubt by accident, and the Indians never knew it was there. It was discovered by the rescue party, and first it appeared smothered to death, but it was revived by first aid treatment.

The posse followed the Indians with the aid of the Indian scout, and I am sure that they eventually got most of them, although they rode into an ambush the first thing, and a young married man named Wright was killed.

An old man named Merrill, and his daughter, were also killed by Indians. The girl was getting ready to be married, and wanted money to buy finery for the wedding, and also a chance to buy the finery. The father started for Clifton with a load of produce, and the girl accompanied him for the purpose of purchasing what she desired. They camped for the night, and the morning being cold, they decided to walk behind the team for a while to warm up. Suddenly there was a shot, and the father fell, shot through the back. The daughter turned and threw her hands to her head in horror. She was shot through the breast and fell, still with her hands upraised. I helped dress the body, and I never before saw such a look of horror on a face as was on hers. The Indians had not molested the bodies, but had burned the wagon and run off the horses.

Mother went blind after we had lived for a while at Safford. One evening when she was alone in the house but for my sister Emma, the youngest of the family, and a little boy, a cousin of Emma’s, the older ones of us were long since married, and Father was away. The three had just sat down to supper when two Indian braves rode up. They had been drinking, and still had a bottle. They sat themselves down at the table and ate supper, and afterward began to look about the house, evidently searching for money. Mother had one lone dollar in the house, and when she saw that their failure to find anything was making them angry, she put the dollar where they could find it, by stealth. They then became good-humored, sat down at the table and commenced playing cards.

They had noticed Emma, who was only a little girl; had asked Mother for the “little papoose” to take to the reservation. Emma had it in her head to go for help from the beginning, but they had watched her so closely that she had had no chance to sneak out. However, soon after they sat down at the table, one of them became quite drunk, and the vigilance of the other relaxed. Emma motioned to her little cousin and they sneaked out. They ran three miles through the dark to the town itself, and barefooted. Emma knew that she was expected to look after her “Ma”, and she soon aroused the town. A wagon was made ready in short order, and Emma was the first to leap into the wagon. Men with guns drove as fast as possible to the house.

In the meantime one of the Indians had fallen under the table in a stupor, while the other appeared half “addled”. However, he heard the wagon approaching and managed to drag his companion outside by the time the wagon had reached the place, all the time looking around dazedly and saying “Where papoose? Where papoose”?

Emma leaped from the wagon and ran with bleeding feet to her mother. The Indian kept begging her, “Papoose tellum Indian good man”.

Emma stamped her foot. “I won’t. John ain’t been a good Indian tonight”, she cried.

The men decided to allow the Indians to go, since they had done no real damage, and they feared the vengeance of other Indians should they punish these.

There was a spring running out of a mountain not so far away from our settlement, and someone had found gold on the hill above the spring. There were several men working the little mine, following the vein of gold. One of the men went down in the hole to set a charge of dynamite. They were accustomed to using a long fuse, and after lighting the fuse, the others would pull him out and then all would retire until after the explosion. They also had an extra large old horse near the hole, for some reason or other. This time the dynamite exploded at once, blowing the man in the hole up in the air and then some distance away, the horse across the creek, and the others to some distance One or two of the men above ground were killed and others injured; but I have never seen such another sight as the man who had been in the hole. His body was intact, but it appeared that his blood vessels had been distended, or that something of that sort had happened. He was blown up like a balloon. I helped prepare him for the funeral, as well as helping care for the injured.

I had been married seventeen years when my husband died, leaving me with three children of my own, and two almost grown step-children, whom I loved and had raised as my own.

About the time of father’s ninety-first birthday, he developed a determination to return to Spartanburg, South Carolina, for a visit. The whole family were opposed, fearing that he could not stand the trip, although he was hale and hearty. He spoke of returning so often that I finally volunteered to return with him. Two days afterward we were on the train. While preparing for our trip I suggested to Father that he keep only a few dollars in his purse and give me the other to sew in the inside of my dress. Father reared back and swelled up, declaring he was certainly old enough to look after his own money. Just the same, I found means to persuade him to give me his money, although I felt none too capable of caring for it myself.

I had quite a scare while on the trip. I leaned my head back and went to sleep one afternoon—I was beginning to be old myself, and was tired. When I awoke, Father was gone. I rushed through two or three cars, but could see nothing of him, and was persuaded that he had fallen out of the train. The conductor sent me to the smoker and there he was! Some of the men had found that he was from Arizona, and he was in his glory telling them tales of the west. Father loved to tell his experiences, which could make one’s hair stand on end.

We crossed the Mississippi on a ferryboat, and it was right after we had again boarded our train that we discovered the pickpocket robbery. I had asked Father to put my purse in his pocket while we were going from the ferry to the train; I was carrying his pillow and blanket, our lunch basket, and other things. Most of our money I had sewed inside my dress, and I felt that Father could look after the nearly empty purse well enough. Our trunk checks were in it, but no one had tried to rob us anyhow, and I had about lost my fear of thieves. As we boarded the train I noticed half a dozen men milling around among the passengers; they were so close to Father that they impeded his movements. I was on the steps of the coach, and I leaned down and said, “Get back there, you men, and let that old man get on the train!”

They kind of melted away, and Father came on into the train. Soon after we were seated, I asked him for the purse. He reached his hand into his pocket, then clapped both hands to his pockets and cried, “Gone!”

Immediately the other passengers began looking for their purses, but almost all had lost theirs also. I was really sorry for some of those people, left on the train without a cent. The conductor gave us orders so that we could recover our trunks, since our checks were stolen with the purse. So far as I know, the thieves were never caught.

We had a nice visit in Spartanburg, which Father had not seen for forty-five years. The trip back was uneventful, and I was always glad that I had humored father in the matter. He was one hundred years, one month, and seventeen days of age when he died.

My daughter’s husband, William Golding, came to Douglas before there was such a place. When I came over, there was but one house on G Avenue (the main street). It was quite a lively place, though, for material was being freighted in for the smelter. The whole place was knee deep in dust from the freight wagons. I followed the nursing profession here from the first. I was maternity nurse for Doctor Armstrong and Doctor Adamson for years, indeed,  until my seventy-fifth birthday. Since then I have sewed and quilted for a living, which I still do.

There is one incident I want to tell you about—a bull fight in Agua Prieta. My son-in-law drove a hack back and forth from Douglas to Agua Prieta, and he wanted to take us. We were anxious enough to go, since we had never…….. crowd--all the seats full and many standing. The fighter….and tormenting the bull for some time, and both his……………………………..he had had no success. He was plenty mad. The torero…………the bull, and throwing, slipped and fell. The bull rushed…………There was no time for him to get to his feet. One of…….cers behind which he could hide in case of need was near. ……on feet and hands as rapidly as possible, toward the door. ….lunge at him as he crawled, and caught his horns in the…………trousers (tights) ripping them almost off the man…….with laughter at the spectacle—the man crawling rapidly on…….his tights hanging in ribbons behind him. He reached the…………..the whole thing taking but a few seconds. I thought the crowd……laughing.
….the bull, and he was skinned and cut into meat in about……………the Mexicans crowded to buy. It seemed they like meat cut while…………….