I was a long, drawn out, tall boy with gangly arms and gangly legs. I was born to be the 4th child out of 9, with two girls and one boy older than me, and three girls and two boys younger than me. We were a family that carried itself through, and we managed to make it as a group in the old house that was up the narrow road not too terribly far from the river. We did not have any money as such, as farming was all of our goals, and hunting, and making each day and each meal our intimate need.
When I was 14, I did my part of keeping up with the families needs and went hunting for squirrels and rabbits and would of picked up anything else I could have gotten, with my fathers 12 gauge, black powder, double barrel shotgun. But it was early October and was still warm. I had worn my black flannel hat, black homemade shirt and black pants. I had fastened my boots up tight and it was fairly warm, so after a couple of hours I had come back to the log-made house and my mother had seen me, and hollered vociferously that the cows hadn't been milked that day and apparently I had forgotten them. She had a harshness in her voice that just split me down the middle, so I stepped in the house and actually tossed that shotgun under the bed, across that wood floor, sort of like an angry 14 year old would do.
That's when I looked up and saw my father standing there, his bearded face turned down, him carrying the soil of that early morning on his pants and coat, and the look of disappointment on his face. Nary a word was said, and I dropped to the floor and reached for the shotgun.
It was back against the wall and I reached as far as I could and grabbed the end of the barrel and snatched it away from the wall and started to pull it out. The quilt that covered the bed was hanging down a little, and I could feel the barrel but couldn't see the gun, so I gave it a yank, and that was when the trigger hung up on a board of the floor that was peeled up a little, the rock hard maple held firmly and in the next partial second there was a loud percussive bang and it felt as though the world was turning that ear-fracturing noise into my world.
In that little piece of time I had pulled the trigger against the board and had cocked my right leg almost against the barrel, and when the gun had gone off, the 12 gauge shell had erupted, threw that load of shot in about an inch round hole through my lower leg, shattered the bone, blew my boot leather and black pants material through my leg, and took out about a six inch curved oblong of the inside of flesh and bone.
Blood ran just a little, as that hot blast of black powder had burnt that outside and inside wound. I felt my body shaking and fear from the moment began to fill my heart. I struggled to get my thoughts and words to fit together, I had broken into a cold sweat. That's when the world went dark.
I was awake in a short time. My father was laying blankets across the end of the bed. My mother had a wet cloth in her hand was rubbing my head with it and patting my chest with the other hand. My ragged pants were draped across the footboard and my pair of wrecked boots sat on the chest at the foot of the bed. I was covered up with a sheet, mother was talking and then I realized she was saying a prayer over and over.
My leg begun to hurt, really hurt. I had chills in my shoulders, heat in my head, guilt rolling off of me in perspiration, and the leg aching like no other feeling I had felt before. No blood was showing inside or outside of the leg, and it was all black from being burned by the powder.
The doctor had been found by my older brother, and he had driven his one horse wagon a few miles to our house. It was 1897 and showers and clean baths were few and far between. When he came in he was dressed in a dirty suit, he had been making calls for a couple of days, and the first thing he drew from his bag was a bottle of laudenaum. He had my mother give him one of her spoons and poured two spoonfuls and had me drink it. It was awful tasting liquid to put in my mouth, but within minutes my leg felt less than wounded.
My father and mother were on both sides of the bed and my brother stood by my chest, and the Doctor told each of them to get ahold of me, they did, and then he poured alcohol directly on my leg. Then the abject feeling of pain took over, and my eyes closed, and I was out.
When I woke again I was in a stupor, but I remember the Dr. peeling back the burnt britches I had on, and pulling out small pieces of it through the torn flesh. I could see the busted bone torn apart in my leg, and I immediately fell back into the numbness I felt from the laudanum . I seem to remember getting one or two more tablespoons of it as I laid there.
There were noises that surrounded me, some hours from being laid out. I opened my eyes barely and I looked about me. Mother was in the kitchen, tending to something, my father was outside probably, and most if not all of the other children were in the house, keeping quiet, for me I guess, and my eyes finally began to focus.
I was lying on my back. Covered up with a sheet, and one of mothers quilts was under my "bad leg" as it began to be called. I was never so sore in my life as the first four days of heading into recovery. The leg felt like a swollen, pounding tree limb. The bottle of laudanum was on the nightstand and a kerosene lamp was softly burning.
I looked up, and there was one of my fathers metal buckets, seemingly scrubbed of wet feed and other things liable to have gotten on it from the barn. There was a heavy nail that had been driven into the cross beam of the ceiling, and the handle was affixed to it there. I watched as a drop of water gathered at the bottom of the bucket, it swole and got bigger, until it hung down from the bucket, and finally dripped. It splashed itself in the center of my inside leg, and flashed water throughout the wound. In what seemed to be a minute, another one had developed and made its splash to the leg again.
This happened until the bucket was empty, and my brother or father would come in, take the bucket down, refill it with fresh well water and hang it back in place, changing the position of my leg, outside, then inside, with each bucket turn. This went on for seven weeks. 24 hours a day. That bucket would drain, the quilt would fill with water, the leg would heal, and my punishment for the time of being stupid and bullheaded would slowly be paid for. I kept living, and eventually walked again a few months later, toward a long life .
(This was told to me in 1972, as Great Grandpa Pritchard sat on the porch and related stories of his youth. He lived til 1982 and died at age 99)
Ralph Peck
Photo by Unknown
Pauls Valley Oklahoma
Photo taken sometime around 1910-15 there was a rock under the front left tire .
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