David Crockett (12 page)

A
FTER
M
ARGARET
E
LDER CAST HIM
aside for another, Crockett laid low for a time, licking his wounds and regretting his lot in life. He had come to the conclusion that he was snake-bit when it came to finding love, just as his father was when it came to staying out of debt. Crockett described himself as someone who had been “born odd, and should always remain so, and nobody would have me.”
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For several weeks he was restless day and night. He hardly slept and practically stopped eating. Canaday and other friends worried about David and tried to boost his spirits.

“They all thought I was sick,” wrote Crockett, “and so I was. And it was the worst kind of sickness—a sickness of the heart, and all the tender parts, produced by disappointed love.”
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As had been the case with other trials and tribulations Crockett had already faced, the passage of time seemed to be the best healing balm. Also, time simply was far too precious to waste on self-pity. “With men of the backwoods, heartache was a luxury,”
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was how James Shackford summed up Crockett’s situation. “The backwoodsman had to arrive at journey’s end restored and prepared for the next stage. The whole of a twenty-year sorrow had to be crammed into a fistful of heart’s-ease gathered along the way of a day’s journeying through the forest.”

Crockett threw himself back into his labors for Canaday and, whenever there was some spare time in the evenings or on the Sabbath, nothing was more restorative than a mind-clearing jaunt in the woods with his rifle in hand. Hunting always proved to be Crockett’s salvation, sanctuary, and escape. Still, like a young god in Ovid’s classic work, he believed that the only way to complete his metamorphosis into manhood was to find a wife.

While out on one of his hunts, Crockett stopped in a forest clearing at the cabin of a woman he described as a “Dutch widow.”
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The woman had a single daughter, but Crockett had no interest in her as a spouse, for although she was smart enough and certainly a skilled conversationalist, she was “as ugly as a stone fence.” Seeing she had little chance of snaring David, the girl told him that “there was as good fish in the sea that had never been caught out of it.” Crockett doubted her, but whether she was right or not, “I was certain that she was not one of them. For she was so homely that it almost give me a pain in the eyes to look at her.”
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In spite of the rejection, the girl invited Crockett to her family’s upcoming reaping, where she promised to introduce him to “one of the prettiest little girls” in attendance.
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David had misgivings, but he enjoyed reapings, the community harvest gatherings that mainly were social events and included plenty of food, drink, dancing, competitions, and opportunities for bragging and storytelling—all pursuits that he savored.

The reaping was fast approaching when David told Canaday that he would give him two days of work if he allowed the bound boy to go along to the festivities. The old Quaker refused and “reproved me pretty considerable roughly for my proposition.” Canaday further advised Crockett to stay away since there would be “a great deal of bad company there” and it might hurt the young man’s good name.
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But Crockett had made a promise to the Dutch girl, so he shouldered his rifle and went to the summer harvest celebration.

Frontier frolics, reapings, corn huskings, and quilting parties meant hard work for those in attendance, but everyone, especially young men like Crockett, looked forward to the good times that followed. Likewise, the house and barn raisings also brought people together. After the work was completed, brush and branches were gathered to feed a fire that blazed all night long. The flames attracted settlers from miles around to come listen to lively fiddles, sip some whiskey, and dance up a storm.
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By the day of the reaping, Crockett had concluded that “the little varment,” as he now called Margaret Elder, had treated him so badly that it was time to put her totally out of his mind and find himself a wife.
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True to her word, the Dutch girl introduced Crockett to the mother of the girl she had told him of earlier. This “old Irish woman,” as Crockett first identified her in his autobiography, was Jean Kennedy Finley, the wife of William Finley, widely known as Billy. Although family records are scarce, it is believed both of the Finleys were born around 1765 in Lincoln County, North Carolina, and wed in 1786, the year of Crockett’s birth. The couple had eight known children—sons John, James, William, Samuel, and David, and daughters Mary Polly, Jean, and Susannah.
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Jean Finley—a loquacious and willful woman—was in no way bashful. She praised Crockett’s rosy red cheeks and told him she had just the sweetheart for him—the eldest of her three daughters, who only used her middle name, Polly. “In the evening I was introduced to her daughter, and I must confess, I was plaguy well pleased with her from the word go. She had a good countenance, and was very pretty, and I was full bent on making up an acquaintance with her.”
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As soon as the fiddlers showed up and dancing commenced, David asked Polly to join him in a reel, a lively dance that originated in the Scottish highlands. The young woman graciously took his calloused hand, and after they finished the dance, she and David found seats together and visited. “I found her very interesting; while I was setting by her, making as good a use of my time as I could, her mother came to us, and very jocularly called me her son-in-law.” Puzzled by this comment, Crockett decided the woman was joking. Nonetheless, he paid as much attention to the mother as to the pretty daughter for the rest of the evening. Even at his young age, Crockett had learned the importance of winning over the mother if he wanted to land the daughter. “I went on the old saying, of salting the cow to catch the calf. I soon became so pleased with this little girl, that I began to think the Dutch girl had told me the truth, when she said there was still good fish in the sea.”
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The frolic lasted until almost sunrise, and when David finally parted from Polly, he “found my mind had become much better reconciled than it had been for a long time.” He went home and made a bargain with the Canaday son who had been his teacher. Crockett promised him six months of work for a “low-priced horse” needed right away so he could properly court Miss Polly Finley. When he mounted his horse—the first one he had ever owned—and rode to the Finley home, David met Polly’s father, Billy, whom he found very affable. Jean Finley was just as talkative as ever.
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The feisty mother bombarded the young man with all sorts of questions to find out if he was the right man for her daughter. Crockett soon discovered that the “old Irish woman” did not like what she heard. Despite the gushing reception he received from Polly’s mother at the reaping where they first met, she was not in favor of a Crockett union with her daughter. Probably Crockett’s financial standing in the community had a lot to do with Jean’s attitude toward him.

Later, when Polly returned home from a meeting escorted by another attentive young man, David began to think “I was barking up the wrong tree again,” but he was determined to make his stand.
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The sun had long disappeared behind the mountains, and when darkness closed in, Polly suggested that, because David had a lengthy ride home ahead of him, he stay for supper and spend the night at the Finley home. “Her mother was deeply enlisted for my rival, and I had to fight against her influence as well as his,” Crockett related. “But the girl was the prize I was fighting for; and as she welcomed me, I was determined to lay siege to her.” His persistence worked and he simply outlasted the other suitor that night. In disgust, the other young man gritted his teeth and skulked off as Crockett shot him hard looks “as fierce as a wildcat.”
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About two weeks after this confrontation, Crockett was out on a wolf hunt with several of his friends and their pack of hounds. They hunted in an area that was new and unfamiliar and Crockett somehow became separated from the others. Not only did he find himself alone, but nightfall was fast approaching, and storm clouds brewed in the darkening sky. Crockett had wandered at least six or seven miles when suddenly he caught a flash of movement in the trees and saw “a little woman streaking it along through the woods like all wrath.”
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Crockett gave chase. “For I was determined I wouldn’t lose sight of her that night anymore. I run on till she saw me, and she stopped.” He caught up with the woman and found, to his surprise and delight, that it was none other than Polly Finley. She had been out searching for her father’s horses and had also lost her way and had no notion of how far she was from home. Crockett was overjoyed with his unexpected bounty.

“For I thought she looked sweeter than sugar; and by this time I loved her almost well enough to eat her.” Instead he restrained himself, and together they followed a footpath that led them to a dwelling where they were given food and shelter. “Here we staid all night,” wrote Crockett. “I set up all night courting; and in the morning we parted. She went to her home, from which we were distant about seven miles, and I to mine, which was ten miles off.”
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Crockett was determined not to allow yet another prospective wife slip away from him. He pressed his wooing of Polly, and tried his level best to win over her headstrong mother. An indication of Crockett’s serious intent to make Polly his bride was revealed when he sold his cherished rifle—the first gun he ever owned—to the Canaday son in order to cut the work time to pay off the debt for his horse.
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Any frontiersman had to be crazily infatuated if he was willing to sell a classic Kentucky rifle of the finest quality to help secure a girl’s hand in marriage.

At last the young couple discussed a wedding date, and David donned his best clothes and rode to the Finley place to ask for Polly’s hand. Billy Finley was cordial, but his wife clearly did not welcome Crockett to her home. “When I got there, the old lady appeared to be mighty wrathy; and when I broached the subject, she looked at me as savage as a meat ax.”
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Crockett tried to use his charm, but nothing seemed to work or soften Jean Finley, whose “Irish was up too high to do any thing with her.” Crockett made sure the Finleys knew that he intended to marry Polly one way or another; if the wedding could not take place at their home, the couple would go elsewhere. Before riding off, David told Polly he would be back in several days with a saddled horse for her to use and that she should be prepared to leave. On his way home, David stopped at the house of a justice of the peace, who agreed to perform the ceremony.

On August 12, 1806, Crockett once again rode to the county seat of Dandridge and went to the courthouse to apply for another marriage license.
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His friend Thomas Doggett, of Morristown, accompanied Crockett. County Clerk Joseph Hamilton issued the marriage bond after both men cosigned, pledging $1,250, an immense sum at the time, on the condition there be “no cause to obstruct the marriage of the said David Crockett with Polly Findley [
sic
].”
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Nothing would prevent this union. On Saturday, August 16, 1806, David, following the custom of the day, gathered an escort that included two of his brothers, a sister-in-law, an unmarried sister, Thomas Doggett, and another friend. With David in the lead, the entourage rode off to fetch Polly. A larger company of friends and neighbors who had heard of the wedding and wished to attend met them about two miles from the Finley place. One of Crockett’s brothers, his sister, and Doggett were sent ahead to the Finley cabin bearing empty flasks, or flagons. Custom called for the vessels to be filled with strong drink to signal that a cordial greeting and hospitality could be expected.
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Jean Finely shunned the riders, but Billy Finley, in turn, ignored his wife. He filled the flasks to overflowing, and the delegation returned to the main group with the tokens of welcome and passed them around for those gathered to quaff before proceeding on to the waiting Polly.

Upon arriving, David remained mounted and asked Polly if she was ready to ride away with him to their marriage. She said she was, and jumped up on the spare horse Crockett led. Then Billy Finley intervened. He stopped the riders at the gate and implored David to stay and have the wedding at his home. David had always respected Polly’s father and replied that he would remain if Jean herself would ask him and also apologize for her rude behavior. Finley summoned his wife, and after an intense private visit, she finally acquiesced. “She came to me and looked at me mighty good, and asked my pardon for what she had said, and invited me to stay,” wrote Crockett about his soon to be mother-in-law. “She said it was the first child she ever had to marry; and she couldn’t bear to see her off in that way; that if I would light, she would do the best she could for us.”

David accepted the offer and immediately sent off for Henry Bradford, the justice of the peace, to perform the ceremony.
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The anxious bridegroom “was afraid to wait long, for fear of another defeat.” That evening at the Finleys’ cabin, with a slew of witnesses looking on, David and Polly were wed. At long last, Crockett’s dream of having a wife had been realized. He was just one day shy of his twentieth birthday, a typical age then for a young man to marry.