Born: May 11, 1839

Helpston, Northamptonshire, England

Married: 1861

Emigrated: 1866 to Nebraska

Died: 1925

"Grandmother Crosby"

From Virginia Elkins’ narrative (beginning on page 2):

In 1866 David and Betsy with their three children Annie, James and Harry left England for the United States. Why they chose to leave their comfortable English home to seek their fortune in the new world I have never heard discussed. The little family moved to Nebraska where they went into the buffalo hide business. Here more children were born into the family, Adah, Clara, Mary, "Bradford, followed by more girls-- twins, Millicent and a still born sister, and Winniferd. A glance at the family record reveals the children were all separated in age by around two years but the boys James, Bradford, and George were about ten years apart so must have had the feeling of being surrounded by girls.

Business prospered and the family lived the rugged life of pioneer settlers. They must have made their mark in the community for a small creek near Chester, Nebraska was named for the family and a sign on the highway reads "Crosby Creek" to this day. Annie by this time was sixteen and left the family home to marry a prosperous farmer, Rueben Huckins who was seventeen years older than she. Annie and Rueb lived in Chester, Nebraska all of their long lives, and they are buried with many of their family members in the little cemetery in that small town. (Chester is right on the state line between Nebraska and Kansas, as a matter of fact the Huckins farm land is actually in Kansas).

David and Betsy and their family of nine children moved again, this time to the vicinity of P1ainvi11e, Rooks County, Kansas. Probably to follow the buffalo herds, who were ever moving farther westward. For some time they lived in a small sod house half under ground and half above. In this sod house still another daughter was born, Esther Elizabeth on September 18, 1880 which indicates that the family move was between 1878 and 1880. In 1882 death visited the family for the first time when son Harry died of typhoid fever at the age of eighteen.

I have heard stories told of the way James, or Jim as he was always called, spent his evenings knitting stockings for the family. With so many sisters it is unusual that the brother was the stocking knitter! The family moved from the sod house into a frame house before the birth of their last child, a fourth son, George Francis, October 9, 1883. So remote from civilization were the family that Clara now a fourteen year old girl was her mother's midwife at the birth of her little brother. Clara took almost full care of the baby and often remarked to me that she felt George was her son not her brother because she had been so close to him during his baby years.

I have heard stories of the danger from prairie fires when the family lived here. One time James made a large fire break by plowing many furrows of soil around and around the house, working at break-neck speed. This was all that saved the family from being burned to death for there was no way they could have outrun the fire.

The family must have lived in this house for about five or six years when raiding Plains Indians, who felt the white man was destroying the buffalo swooped down upon them, burned their whole fortune in buffalo hides, as well as destroying all their other property. The family saved their lives by hiding in a remote gulch until the raiders were gone. But they never again recouped their status or wealth. Devastated by this misfortune, they moved again, this time to Denver, Colorado where it was thought there would be an opportunity to find work for the members of the family. David's health was broken probably as much by this turn in his fortune as by his physical condition. He had what was known in that day as Bright's disease, a kidney malfunction. David died on April 27,1892 at the age of 63, when young George was only nine. His two brothers James and Bradford had found work at the Summit Fuel and Grain Company driving teams of horses which delivered coal and grain. At twelve, because George was such a "big" boy for his age, and due to his "hairy" nature having already begun to shave, he passed for a young man older than his years and he too got a job at the Summit Company where he did a man's work for many years. He had a great love for horses, and always took excellent care of the animals in his charge, never abusing them in any way. He has often told me stories about different horses and mules he "worked", easily betraying his affection for the animals. Mules were the smartest animals he thought. But lifting the heavy sacks of grain and shoveling the tons of coal took their toll on young George and to his dying day huge lumps of ruptured muscle on his body bore witness to overwork done as a very young man.

Everyone in the family found work in Denver of one kind or another, and so the years from 1892 to 1905 passed for the Crosby family. There was a great depression during the 1890's which George always declared was worse than the one in the 1930's. But the family weathered it without anyone losing their livelihood.

During this time some left the home nest to start families of their own. Clara met a handsome Englishman, James Black, married him and moved to a huge sheep ranch in Idaho. Jim fell in love with Sophia Alvina Louise Endty always known as Alice. (Alice's birthday was on February 29th and she would argue for hours about her age--always claiming only times she had had a birthday, while Jim insisted she was as old as the years she had lived, as far as I know they never settled the argument.) Brad married June, the same year and they both moved into homes of their own in Denver. In 1895 Milly married James Arthur Hudson. Adah married a Mr. Castor and Marya Mr. Wilson and they moved away from Denver. (I have no idea of these dates or where they went to make their homes). So only George, Esther, Winnie, and Grandma Crosby were left in the house at 3232 West Hayward Place.

Esther and Winnie were seamstresses and worked for Daniels and Fishers, the most prestigious dry goods store in Denver. Women in those days did not buy ready-made clothes, but chose materials and had them made to order. (It was of scraps from those rich ladies' dresses that Grandma Metzger made our heirloom crazy quilt). Esther was particularly talented, not only as a seamstress (they always said she could make anything with her needle), but also as a musician having a beautiful contralto voice, she was the soloist at Trinity Methodist Church, the largest downtown Church in Denver at that time. George and Winnie also sang in the choir where their good voices were an asset. George served as the girls protector and companion on the many night time street car rides to and from church. And a protector must have been needed back in those days for one time when Winnie was coming home from work alone on a dark winter evening, she was accosted by a drunken man.