5. 7. 1833 Atlantic Crossing

A brief diary, or sailing vessel log, (with the first two pages torn off), was found by former area residents Charlotte and Carolyn Meyer of Eagle Fork Farms, Moscow Mills, Missouri.

These precious records were prepared by their great- grandfather Carl Friederich Meyer, who sailed to the foreboding shores of America from Hamburg, Germany in 1833 with his wife Agnes (Horst) Meyer, their daughter Louise, and with at least 170 other passengers. The passenger list is separated into 36 family groups. Ages are shown and only eighteen range from 35 to 61 years old. The remaining 149 are young couples and their children. Carl was 31 1/2, Agnes was 25 1/2 and Louise was just 1 1/4 years old.

Although the first pages were torn away we can assume that the departure date was late in July 1833. Carl penned a short sentence for each day, and some of the more interesting notations during the long two and one-ha1f month voyage are as follows:

Aug.11 Saw Helgoland light. Noise of the ship and groaning of passengers on approach to English Channel in severe storm.
Aug.20 Entered English Channel after four days of storms.
Aug.28 entered the Atlantic.
Aug.31. Sail tore in another bad storm.
Sept.5 Must go 200 miles to the trade winds. Coffee and tea is sour, and hardtack is moldy.
Sept. 15 Girl died of smallpox, and was buried at sea, leaving her aged blind father and small brothers alone in the world.
Sept.23 Conspiracy and grumbling among passengers. The captain fired several times during the evening, and things quieted down.
Sept26 Complaints of body lice.
Oct.6 Saw mountains of Cuba off right hand.
Oct.l0 At 10 PM steered north and entered Gulf of Mexico.
Oct.15 27 degrees, and should arrive at New Orleans in few days.
Oct.16 Pilot came out and got aboard.

The diary ends abruptly here, but from information learned by the Meyer sisters from their parents and grand-parents, Carl and his family, along with certain other family groups, took a steamboat and headed up the Mississippi River for St. Louis. They were in a joyous mood. They had safely crossed the treacherous Atlantic Ocean, and were now bound for their new home in Gottfried Duden’s Femme Osage country. Disaster, however, struck near St. Genevieve when their steamboat caught fire and sunk. But for a few items all belongings were lost. The Meyers managed to save a large "Reisekoffer" (trunk) which included some cooking utensils.

It was now late October. They could go no farther until Spring, so the entire party camped on the river bank all winter. The hardships encountered during that winter are Un- known, but some how they arrived in the Fernme Osage area, and Carl bought land from Nathan Boone, directly across the Femme Osage Creek from the Boone home. Carl and his daughter Louise, are buried there on that farm.

A son of Carl and Agnes was born in 1834 in Femme Osage. He, the grand-father of Charlotte and Carolyn, told how Carl became an ardent follower of Gottfried Duden.

The Meyers moved to Eagle Fork in 1871.

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