Becoming Abraham Lincoln by Richard Kigel

Author:Richard Kigel
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Skyhorse Publishing
Published: 2017-03-14T04:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 19

“I found him no green horn.”

As the deep snows melted in the spring, a fresh new breeze blew in off the Sangamon River. He was loud and windy, a fast-talking, hard-drinking maker of schemes, a chaser of dreams. Denton Offutt was a visionary businessman, a hopeful hustler.

“He was certainly an odd character,” said Herndon.1 Some folks said he was “a clear-headed, brisk man of affairs.” Others thought differently. “Wild, noisy, reckless,” they said, “rattlebrained, unsteady and improvident.” 2 James Short of New Salem described him as a “wild harum-scarum kind of a man.” 3

Denton Offutt came to Decatur with a plan. He had a newly acquired stock of goods and was looking to make a handsome profit by selling them down in New Orleans. He needed some hired help to get it there, so he went looking for John Hanks.

“Offutt came to my house in February 1831,” said Hanks. “Wanted to hire me to run a flatboat for him, saying that he had heard that I was quite a flatboat man in Kentucky. He wanted me to go badly.” 4

John Hanks knew that if he was going to make the trip he’d need a good crew of experienced, reliable men. “I went and saw Abe and John Johnston,” he said. “Introduced Offutt to them. We made an engagement with Offutt at 50 cents per day and $60 to make the trip to New Orleans.” 5

Said Abe: “[We] were to join him—Offutt—at Springfield, Illinois as soon as the snow should go off. When it did go off, which was about the first of March 1831, the county was so flooded as to make traveling by land impracticable. … Purchased a large canoe and came down the Sangamon River in it.” 6

“Abe and I came down the Sangamon River in a canoe in March 1831,” recalled John Hanks. “Landed at what is now called … Jamestown, five miles east of Springfield. … We left our canoe … walked afoot to Springfield and found Offutt. He was at a tavern. Probably Elliot’s. It was Elliot’s.” 7

Andrew Elliot kept the finest tavern in Springfield, the Buckhorn Inn. A painted head of a big buck hung above the front door. When the boys met Denton Offutt, he was cheerfully enjoying Mr. Elliot’s fine spirits.

As part of the deal, Offutt had promised the boys that he would have a boat ready for them. “Learned from him that he had failed in getting a boat,” said Abe. 8

The crew was undaunted. They would build their own boat for pay. Offutt agreed to hire them to build a flatboat at twelve dollars a month.

“Abe, Johnston and myself went down to the mouth of Spring Creek and there cut the timbers to make the boat,” recalled John Hanks.

“We were about two weeks cutting our timber,” he said. “We then rafted the logs down to the Sangamon River, to what is called Sangamontown, seven miles northwest of Springfield.

“When we got to Sangamontown we made a shanty shed. Abe was elected cook.

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