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Nor did he fear when Dennis came one morning and in choking tones said that both his uncle and aunt were stricken in the little half-faced camp but a few hundred yards away. He was sorry for Dennis. He had never known father or mother only this uncle and aunt. "Don't you worry, Dennis," the Boy said tenderly. "You'll live with us if they die." They both died within a few days.
Breadstuff could be had only by sending young Abraham seven miles on horseback with a bag of corn to be ground in a hand grist-mill. About the time the new cabin was ready relatives and friends followed from Kentucky, and some of these in turn occupied the half-faced camp.
The amount of land was one quarter section, or one hundred and sixty acres. The next thing was to erect a cabin. In this case the cabin consisted of what was called a half-faced camp. That is, the structure was entirely open on one of its four sides. This was at the lower side of the roof, and the opening was partly concealed by the hanging of the skins of deer and other wild animals.
The country was thickly wooded; the settler had before him at the outset heavy toil in clearing the ground and in building some rude shelter, a house or just a "half-faced camp," that is, a shed with one side open to the weather such as that in which the Lincoln family passed their first winter near Gentryville.
Our dogs stopped and curled themselves up into little round balls on the snow, as if conscious that the long day's journey was ended, while our drivers proceeded to make rapidly and systematically a Siberian half-faced camp.
The lateness of the autumn made it necessary to put up a shelter as quickly as possible, and he built what was known on the frontier as a half-faced camp, about fourteen feet square. This differed from a cabin in that it was closed on only three sides, being quite open to the weather on the fourth.
A color-bearer sprang forward with the battle-flag. He halted beside me and rested the end of the flagstaff on the ground. He half-faced about toward the men. His voice rang out like a bugle blast, as he raised his arm and shouted: "Here are your colors!"
In putting up the "half-faced" camp, he was his father's principal helper. Afterward, when they built a more, substantial cabin to take the place of the camp, he learned to handle an ax, a maul, and a wedge. He helped to fell trees, fashion logs, split rails, and do other important work in building the one-roomed cabin, which was to be the permanent home of the family.
It was the same heavy labor over again that they had endured when they went from Kentucky to Indiana; but this time the strength and energy of young Abraham were at hand to inspire and aid his father, and there was no miserable shivering year of waiting in a half-faced camp before the family could be suitably housed. They were not to escape hardship, however.
The Log Cabin.% In that case the settler would cut down a few saplings, make a "half-faced camp," and begin his clearing. The "half-faced camp" was a shed. Three sides were of logs laid one on another horizontally. The roof was of saplings covered with branches or bark. The fourth side was open, and when it rained was closed by hanging up deerskin curtains.
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