Peter Matthiessen - Killing Mister Watson

In late October, Mr. Charley Johnson slaughtered his hogs and sold the meat at 15 cents a pound. Mr. Waller had departed Needhelp and was "working for Mr. E.J. Watson at Chatham River."

In November, the trading vessel Ruth loaded at Chokoloskee for her last trip of the season. "Chokoloskee will be dead then," McKinney wrote, "or at least deader than usual. We have no preacher, no Sunday school, no dancing, but we have noticed someone being around once in a while with some low bush lightning [moonshine]." Up at Needhelp, Miss H.M. Smith had "chills and fever. She is very brave to face all that wild woods and chills and fever alone."

In early December, Hannah Smith came to Chokoloskee to be treated by Mr. McKinney. Mr. Waller was expected back at Needhelp to help her finish up her business. Gene Roberts, Charlie McKinney (the columnist's son), Andrew Wiggins, and Jim Howell were hunting deer and turkey around Needhelp, and once again, the column lamented deer slaughter by Indians for the buckskin trade.

Hookworm was "rife" at Chatham Bend. Mr. D.D. House was still shipping tomatoes from his Chokoloskee place but had returned now to House Hammock to commence syrup-making.

In late December, while the cattle in the Fort Myers streets ate Mr. Edison's newly donated royal palms on Riverside Avenue, Charlie McKinney and Jim Howell killed ten gators in one night up Turner River, under the dark of the moon. The Indian Charlie Tommie, who came in to sell 15 otter pelts to George Storter for $9 each, reported that Miss Hannah Smith had suffered a fall and broke her rib at Needhelp, and that Mr. Waller was there assisting her. Bill and Dan House, discouraged by Honduras, returned home in time for Christmas with a monkey and four parrots.

The Key West trading ship, carrying Christmas goods, had not arrived. "We learn from Mr. E.J. Watson that he [the captain] was not in Key West last Monday at 9 a.m."

Cold weather at the end of December 1909 ruined the last of D.D. House's tomatoes. Ice was seen in an old boat. In early January, in his column in The American Eagle, C.G. McKinney reported that the hunters were still taking coons and otters. (Ft. Myers reported that on a visit to Immokalee, Sheriff Frank B. Tippins shot a turkey.) The Chokoloskee school reopened, and not long thereafter a new preacher came. Hens were laying again despite lot of showers "unusual for this time of year." D.D. House, William Wiggins, and George Storter were producing fine syrup-Storter's cane mill was "running full blast"-but everyone was short of syrup tins; Mr. Wiggins put up his syrup in white bottles.

In February, Miss Smith at Needhelp dug her last crop of potatoes, which traveled to Chokoloskee in Charlie Tommie's dugout. Andrew Wiggins was raising potatoes and cane in Rodgers River. Bill House traveled to Key West to buy a boat.

Halley's Comet was glimpsed, it would return in May.

(Increase Mather of New England witnessed "the Star of Bethlehem" on its traverse of 1682, when Edmond Halley gave his name to it, and exhorted his flock not to persist in their sinning until "God sends his arrows from Heaven to smite them down into the grave." In 1910, in the Huge consternation caused by the Great Comet, it was predicted that the earth's passage through its streaming tail might bring about the extinction of the human race by "cyanogen gas." Though unfamiliar with the perils of cyanogen gas, Chokoloskee residents had little doubt that the comet portended the arrival of Judgment Day upon the earth in the form of storms, floods, droughts, and plagues and other natural afflictions, among which not a few would be laid at the door of Mr. Watson.)

"Mr. E.J. Watson will finish syrup-making this week [early March]. He reports having made nearly twenty thousand gallons."

Miss Hannah Smith has dug 2000 lbs. of "malangoes," killed her last hog, plans to leave Needhelp with her dog and two cats once she has harvested her cabbages, which she plans to ship to the Key West market on W.W. (Bill) House's new boat, the Rosina. Bill House and Young Dan are now partners in the shipping trade, and are loading cargoes of cane, syrup, fruit, and oysters.

Charley Johnson and Walter Alderman have contracted "Honduras fever," and are talking about seeking their fortune in Honduras.

"Everyone approves the new preacher, Brother Jones, but the teacher, Mr. Daughtry, has closed the school for want of pupils."

The Eagle reports much excitement over the upcoming fight between the black champion Jack Johnson and Mr. Jim Jeffries, the White Hope.

"In April, the coast weather is still dry, and most of the island's fresh water is brought down from Needhelp. No fishing yet to speak of, but new icehouses are being built for the summer season.

McKinney noted that few actually danced at a dance given by Gregorio Lopez-they were either too old or too young, he comments, and there was "no booze." Charlie McKinney, Charley and Mack Johnson, and Jim Demere leave on a long gator hunt. Mr. Shorty Weeks will be running the mail boat, Chokoloskee to Marco.

"Mr. John A. Johnson and Mr. Leroy Parks were on the Island today from Pavilion Key." (Johnson was one of seven husbands outlived by Pearl Watson's mother, Josephine Jenkins, and Leroy Parks was her son by another.)

"Captain W.W. House, his brother Dan, and their father are going to sail tomorrow for Ft. Myers with a cargo of ornamental plants for the homes of the upper ten."

"Miss Hannah Smith has left the Needhelp settlement and is now staying at Mr. E.J. Watson's place at Chatham Bend."

I remember the day, it was April 1910, when Watson hired poor Miss Hannah Smith. Old Man Waller, worked at Watson's, come in to the store with a woman three times the common size, introduced her to his boss as a prime female who could outwork three men ricking buttonwood and show a horse a trick or two about spring plowing. By that he meant behind a horse, not putting the traces to Miss Hannah.

Well, Watson said he had a horse already, but Dolphus was old and useless now, and the sorry help he had at Chatham Bend-and he winked at Waller-couldn't pour piss out of a boot with the instructions written on the heel. That was the first time we heard that one, and us fellers roared. There was some shine being passed around, and we all decided we better have another. If Hannah Smith would come on home with him, Watson was claiming, show this old hog thief Waller how to work a ax, maybe he could yoke her up alongside Dolphus when time come to plow. Or maybe-he said this real serious, lifting his hat-him and her could get yoked up together when poor ol' Green had drunk hisself under the table.

Well, they laughed hard over that one, too, all but Old Waller. I seen straight off Waller was sweet on Hannah, cause she was handsome way a man is handsome-looked like a man wearing a wig-while he was ugly, and lame, too, all bones and patches. From the wear on him, he'd had more rough in life than smooth, and had that habit. Watson was tipping his hat to him-this was the bully that come out when he was drinking-and Big Hannah looked across at that old man of hers, see what he'd do. But Waller only belched and then looked vague, like that was a belch that needed some consideration.

Before she drifted down to Chatham Bend, this Hannah Smith from the Okefenokee Swamp in Georgia had been around the Bay a year or two. Had a sister, Sadie, was camped across the Glades northwest of Homestead, where they call Paradise today. Their folks got word to Sadie that Hannah was at Everglade, and asked would she kindly pay a call on her little sister, see if she was getting on in life all right.