Iron and Reins: The Unbroken Life of David Solomon Bailey

 

Elkhorn Nebraska c. 1890

From Buckeye Roots to the Iowa Frontier

The story of David Solomon Bailey began on December 8, 1837, in Columbus, Franklin County, Ohio. Born to Orange Bailey and Lydia Waggoner, David spent his earliest years among the hardwood forests and expanding settlements of central Ohio. But mid-19th-century America was defined by relentless westward motion, and the Bailey family was no exception.

In 1845, when David was just seven years old, the family loaded their belongings into a covered wagon and joined the pioneer trail bound for the Iowa Territory—a raw, newly opening frontier on the banks of the Mississippi River. The journey was grueling, but the hardest blow fell shortly after their arrival. In August 1847, in Marion Township, Davis County, Iowa, nine-year-old David suffered the devastating loss of his mother, Lydia.

Growing up fast in the Iowa countryside, David learned the heavy physical labor of frontier farming. By his early twenties, he settled in nearby Moravia, Appanoose County. It was there that he met and courted Sophia Boyd, the daughter of Valentine Boyd, a respected local blacksmith in Union, Iowa. The young couple married on March 13, 1859. With his new father-in-law shaping iron at the forge, David set out to build a quiet life as an Iowa farmer, welcoming his first son, William, shortly before the nation fractured into civil war.

Guerrilla Terror and the Call to Arms

For the first three years of the Civil War, David remained home in southern Iowa, tending his farm and raising his young family. Southern Iowa, however, was not far from the bloody border conflicts of Missouri. By late 1863 and early 1864, the region was plagued by violent, pro-Confederate bushwhackers and guerrilla raiders who crossed the border to terrorize civilian settlements, loot farms, and ambush Union sympathizers.

The sudden, chaotic threat to his home and family transformed a 27-year-old husband and father into a soldier. On February 18, 1864, David left his farm in Van Buren County and traveled to Keokuk, Iowa, enlisting as a private in Company G of the 3rd Iowa Cavalry.

  [FEB 18, 1864]          [MAR 16, 1864]            [JUNE 1-9, 1864]           [JUNE 10, 1864]

Enlisted at Keokuk ──► Mustered into Co. G ──► Sturgis Expedition March ──► Battle of Brice's Cross Roads

                       (Memphis, TN)           (Memphis to Mississippi)        (Severely Wounded)

Mustered into service on March 16, 1864, Private Bailey was deployed to Memphis, Tennessee, joining his regiment for patrol duties against Confederate Major General Nathan Bedford Forrest. In June 1864, Brigadier General Samuel D. Sturgis led a Union column of 8,000 men deep into northern Mississippi to pin down Forrest's cavalry and protect Sherman's vital supply lines during the Atlanta Campaign.

Disaster at Brice’s Cross Roads

On the sweltering, 90-degree morning of June 10, 1864, the column met Forrest’s forces near Guntown, Mississippi, at an intersection known as Brice’s Cross Roads. Company G of the 3rd Iowa Cavalry dismounted and entered dense oak thickets, using multi-shot Spencer repeating carbines to hold back aggressive Confederate charges for hours.

Battle Stage	Tactical Development
Morning (10:00 AM)	Dismounted 3rd Iowa Cavalry holds the line against fierce attacks in stifling heat.
Afternoon (1:30 PM)	Exhausted Union infantry arrives; Forrest launches simultaneous double-flank attacks.
The Panic (3:30 PM)	Union lines collapse; an overturned wagon blocks the Tishomingo Creek bridge, triggering a retreat.

As the Union retreat collapsed into chaos across Tishomingo Creek, hundreds of severely wounded men were left behind at makeshift field hospitals. Among them was Private David Bailey, whose right leg had been shattered by enemy fire. Unable to walk, David was captured as a prisoner of war. A field surgeon performed an emergency amputation of his right leg below the knee under crude conditions.

  [JUNE 10, 1864]           [SUMMER 1864]          [FALL 1864 - SPRING 1865]       [SEP 11, 1865]

Severe Leg Wound & ──► Confederate Field Hosp. ──► Paroled to US Gen. Hospital ──► Honorably Discharged

   Amputation             & Mobile Care              (Memphis / Keokuk)              ("Disch Wounds")

Because caring for amputees strained Confederate resources, David was paroled under a flag of truce in late 1864 and transferred to Union general hospitals in Memphis and Iowa. He spent fifteen grueling months recovering from infection and learning to navigate life on a wooden peg leg before receiving his medical discharge on September 11, 1865.

The Frontier Teamster of Nebraska

1905 Sophia (Boyd) & David Bailey with their

brother-in-law Frances Holland Shonkwiler

Returning to Moravia, Iowa, missing his right leg would have permanently sidelined many men, but David refused to accept invalidism. Driven by the promise of cheap land under the Homestead Act—which allowed Union veterans to count military service toward residency requirements—David gathered Sophia and their growing family. Between 1867 and 1869, they journeyed 200 miles west in a covered wagon to Douglas County, Nebraska, settling near Elkhorn along the newly completed Union Pacific Railroad.

                    1890 OMAHA FREIGHT & TEAMSTER NETWORK

                    

  [Union Pacific Railyards] ──► [Jobbing District & Warehouses]

                                          │

                                (Heavy Drayage Vans)

                                          │

  [Stockyards & Smelters]   ──► [Paved Streets vs. Mud Roads]

On the Nebraska prairie, David turned his physical limitations into a specialized craft. While hand-plowing on a peg leg was grueling, handling draft horses relied on voice, hands, balance, and quiet authority. David began breeding Belgian draft horses—massive, calm, muscular horses prized for heavy hauling.

By 1890, Omaha had exploded into a roaring metropolis of 140,000 people, serving as the "Gateway to the West." David worked as a heavy commercial teamster, maneuvering broad-chested draft teams pulling iron-axled drayage wagons loaded with timber, grain, and machinery through crowded downtown streets. To drive heavy teams with an amputated leg, he relied on custom wagon modifications, including a high, padded box-seat and custom foot-braces to leverage the wooden wheel brakes.

  [1867–1869]  Move to Nebraska ──► Settled Elkhorn, Douglas County; daughter "Pink" born 1870.

       │

  [1870s–1880s] Draft Horse Breeding ──► Raised Belgian draft horses for farm and city freighting.

       │

  [1890s]      Omaha Teamstering ──► Hauled industrial drayage; partnered in Fowler seed business.

       │

  [JUL 19, 1915] Final Rest     ──► Passed away at age 77; buried in Elkhorn, Nebraska.

As the agricultural industry expanded, David connected his draft-horse operation with local trade. When his daughter Mahalia Margaret ("Pink") married Charles B. Fowler, David partnered with his son-in-law in the booming regional seed and grain business, hauling sacks of seed corn and grain between farms and rail depots in Waterloo and Elkhorn.

Despite enduring the loss of his daughter Celestia in 1893 and his beloved wife Sophia in 1908, David remained a steady fixture of Western Douglas County. When he passed away on July 19, 1915, at the age of 77, local newspapers honored him as a true pioneer veteran—a man who lost a limb on a Civil War battlefield but built a legacy through sheer grit on the Nebraska frontier.

Battle Stage

Tactical Development

Morning (10:00 AM)

Dismounted 3rd Iowa Cavalry holds the line against fierce attacks in stifling heat.

Afternoon (1:30 PM)

Exhausted Union infantry arrives; Forrest launches simultaneous double-flank attacks.

The Panic (3:30 PM)

Union lines collapse; an overturned wagon blocks the Tishomingo Creek bridge, triggering a retreat.

1890 Iowa, (front row l-r) Orange Bailey, David Solomon Bailey, 

David Jackson Bailey and Sophia Boyd Bailey (back row unknown)

Thank you Gemini AI for your wisdom and research assistance. -- Drifting Cowboy

IDAHO PIONEERS: David Jackson Bailey’s Backtrail

 

Before our family ever cut timber in the Flathead Valley or turned wheat ground on Texas Ridge, my great-grandfather David Jackson Bailey (1865–1949) was out riding the wind-scoured plains of Nebraska as a genuine frontier cowboy.

David spent a lifetime doing things the hard way—from stacking thick blue-joint sod in the 1880s to harness-milling cane molasses with an old horse named Dynamite in his eighties. He was built from iron-hard timber, and he set a standard for pioneer endurance that echoes all the way down our family tree.

From Iowa Child to Plains Cowboy (1865–1884)

David Jackson’s eldest son, Franklin, with a Belgian colt, c. 1898

Born on November 19, 1865, in Moravia, Iowa, David was the eldest son of David Solomon Bailey—a Union cavalryman who came home from the Civil War with severe wounds—and Sophia Boyd. Around 1870, when David was just five years old, the family pulled up stakes and pushed west to Elkhorn, Nebraska.

Coming of age on the open ranges of eastern and central Nebraska, David worked as a young range cowboy. He learned the subtle arts of handling cattle, breaking stubborn horses, and surviving on open plains that could freeze you in winter and bake you in summer.

                  THE NEBRASKA FRONTIER TRAIL

                  

  [1865] Born in Moravia, Appanoose County, Iowa

    │

  [1870] Moves West with Family to Elkhorn, Nebraska

    │

  [1880s] Cowboy Era: Rides Open Range & Handles Livestock

    │

  [1884] Homesteads in Valley Co. & Marries Lillian Amanda Pierce

According to regional pioneer records preserved in the Nez Perce County Archives, those early range years forged David's lifelong identity as a horseman—a skill set he passed directly down to his sons and descendants.

The Soddy Era: Liberty Township, Nebraska (1884–1903)

In 1884, just before turning nineteen, David headed into central Nebraska to stake a claim in Liberty Township, Valley County. On October 27, 1884, he married Lillian Amanda Pierce (1867–1957), daughter of a Union soldier and seasoned homesteader.

                                    THE VALLEY COUNTY SODDY

                     

  • Wall Construction: 2-foot thick "Nebraska Bricks" (Blue-joint sod)

  • Insulation Value: Cool during 100°F summers, warm in prairie blizzards

  • Daily Realities: Muddy water leaks during rains; snakes & field mice

  • Work Engines: Giant Belgian draft horses for deep-plowing thick sod

With native trees virtually non-existent on the sprawling prairie, David hitched a heavy breaking plow and sliced thick strips of dense, root-tangled blue-joint grass to build a sod house ("soddy").

Stacked two feet deep, these native bricks provided incredible insulation against 100 degree summer heatwaves and sub-zero blizzards. But life inside was a constant wrestling match with nature. Heavy prairie rains caused muddy water to drip through thatch roofs for days, and snakes, field mice, and insects routinely burrowed through the earth walls.

For nearly twenty years, David and Lillian farmed that harsh ground, relying on massive Belgian draft horses to break the stubborn soil. It was inside this three-room soddy that six of their seven children were born, including my grandfather, Franklin Jackson Bailey (1886–1968).

Driven Out by the Great Droughts

By the late 1890s, the Nebraska plains turned punishing. A relentless cycle of severe droughts dried the topsoil into powder, while howling prairie winds literally blew planted seed rows right out of the ground.

                                   THE BATTLING YEARS

                       

 [NEBRASKA (1884–1903)]              [IDAHO (1903–1949)]

  • 20 Years in a 3-Room Soddy        • Timber Logging on Bear Ridge

  • Continuous Droughts & Dust        • Deep Wheat Farming on Texas Ridge

  • Sorghum Cane for Winter Sweet     • Final Years in Lewiston Orchards

As an old newspaper account recalled decades later, the Baileys survived those brutal years by growing sorghum cane—one of the few crops that could withstand the scorching drought—and milling homemade cane cider down into molasses syrup to sweeten their children's meager meals.

c. 1910 Kendrick, Idaho

Crossing to the Pacific Northwest: Kendrick & Bear Ridge

By 1903, the endless dust and crop failures finally broke David's hold on Valley County. Packing their heavy farm wagons, David and Lillian pointed their Belgian teams toward the Pacific Northwest, establishing a new homestead near Kendrick, Latah County, Idaho.

                               THE THREE-CHAPTER LIFE

                   

  [1865–1903] NEBRASKA SODDY ── 20-Year Stand Against Prairie Drought

    │

  [1903–1928] KENDRICK HOMESTEAD ── Timber & Farming on Bear Ridge

    │

  [1928–1949] LEWISTON ORCHARDS ── 5-Acre Cane Mill & "Dynamite"

c. 1920 Jackson Bailey farm (Kendrick, Idaho)

Jackson in his orchard c. 1920

For a quarter-century, David logged timber and farmed wheat on the high, fertile soils of Bear Ridge and Texas Ridge, where their seventh child, Curtis, was born in 1904. Where Nebraska had offered sand and wind, Idaho offered deep volcanic soil, high pine timber, and reliable rainfall.

The Cane Molasses Factory & Old "Dynamite"

Around 1928, approaching retirement age, David and Lillian moved down into the mild valley of Lewiston Orchards in Nez Perce County. But "retirement" was a concept David never quite understood. On a five-acre tract, they raised fruit, kept chickens and bees, and built a famous homemade cane molasses mill.

Dynamite, Jackson and Lillian pressing cane, c. 1945

An article published in the local Lewiston Orchards newspaper around 1946 captured the couple in their late seventies, still working with the energy of youth:

"Mounted on a concrete pier is a cane press... rigged with a long homemade sweep pole. To the long end, Mr. Bailey hitches a fat, wise, old, and trusty horse by the forceful name of 'Dynamite'... As Dynamite reluctantly gets into clockwise motion, the press begins to turn, feeding stalks through to squeeze out fresh cane cider."

Together, David and Lillian cooked down the cider in an outdoor furnace, producing gallons of golden syrup for neighbors across the valley.

                    THE LEWISTON CANE MILL

                    

         [10-Foot Pole] ── Harness Sweep

               │

      [Old "Dynamite"] ── Trusty Horse Power (Clockwise Walk)

               │

        [Cane Press]   ── Crushes Stalks for Cider

               │

      [Outdoor Furnace] ── 3-Hour Reduction to Golden Molasses

A Cowboy to the Very End

c. 1945, David Jackson Bailey

David Jackson Bailey lived to be 83 years old, passing away on May 12, 1949, in Lewiston, Idaho.

In a testament to the unyielding horseman he was, his death was brought on by pneumonia following severe injuries he suffered while breaking a horse at age eighty-three. He died as he had lived: in the saddle, working livestock, and refusing to hand over the reins. He lies at rest in Normal Hill Cemetery in Lewiston, Idaho.

(left to right) (Back row) Franklin, Marcus, Meda, Len and George; 

(Front row) Curtis, David Jackson, Lillian and Clara, c. 1908 

Key Family Genealogy Notes

• David Jackson Bailey: b. 19 Nov 1865, Moravia, IA – d. 12 May 1949, Lewiston, ID.
• Lillian Amanda Pierce: b. 11 Sep 1867, Elkhorn, NE – d. 10 Dec 1957, Lewiston, ID.
• Burial: Normal Hill Cemetery, Lewiston, Nez Perce County, Idaho.
• Children of David Jackson & Lillian:
1. Franklin Jackson Bailey (1886–1968) – Montana homesteader & WWII worker.
2. Marcus Leroy Bailey (1888–1979) – Latah County, ID resident.
3. David Leonard Bailey (1890–1962) – Went to Montana with Frank in 1908.
4. Meda Elvira Bailey (1892–1967) – Married Herb Slocum; Lewiston dairy farmer.
5. George Frederick "Fred" Bailey (1894–1962) – Idaho resident.
6. Clara Lillian Bailey (1900–1961) – Born in Nebraska soddy.
7. Curtis Pierce Bailey (1904–1978) – Born on Bear Ridge, Kendrick, ID.

c. 1910 Meda Bailey wearing a brother’s campaign hat

c. 1914 Clara Bailey riding her brother's horse, Kendrick ID

A gift from an old neighbor—Texas Ridge, Idaho, 2020—Jackson’s farm 100 years later

Thank you Gemini AI for your wisdom and research assistance. -- Drifting Cowboy