Forgetting Tabitha: An Orphan Train Rider (6 page)

After an hour on the splintered wooden platform paraded like cattle, four children were officially adopted. Two big strapping fellows that rode in the boxcar were taken together by a dairy farmer; the boys seemed glad of it and thanked Sister Agnes for her kindness. It was very Christian of them and I put it in my head to remember for when my time came. Then two of our youngest went to a couple who must have been unable to bear their own children. The proud parents held the babies up in delight, cuddling and kissing them already.

Sadly, fifteen of us remained orphans and boarded the train once more feeling an uncanny mix of apprehension and excitement as we headed towards our second destination in Ohio. The smaller children were terrified of the dark and had difficulty sleeping. Edmund’s lungs rattled and wheezed at night and his coughing fits kept the majority of us awake. I laid him across my lap and pat his back with cupped hands and this did help bring up the phlegm that clogged his airways. He had no place to spit the mucus so he swallowed it down once more. Agnes did her best to quell the fears of the kids by singing lullabies at night and sacrificing her own sleep to ensure everyone was comfortable, warm, and felt safe.

Aside from a quiet thirteen year old boy I was the oldest charge in the carriage portion of the train so I did my best to help calm the children. I told them stories from my days on the farm, describing the funny things the animals did. I told them about Harriett the hen who chased me around her pen when I tried to steal her eggs, she would cluck and flap her wings at me while I gathered our breakfast. I told them of my pony Oliver too and how I used to brush and braid his long tail sometimes adding wooden beads in the braid for decoration. However, when Sister Agnes heard me recounting my days on the farm she reminded me I was to forget everything from my past. I had difficulty making up stories so I relied on the few my mama told me;
Hansel and Gretel
and
Little Red Riding Hood
were favorites.

The children grew more sullen as we traveled west, tummies grumbled and germs passed between us causing colds and numerous fevers. We were given pails containing a snack of crackers and orange juice to curb our appetites until we stopped at night for a more filling supper. Our dinners were preceded by a prayer, and if we were able to coordinate our meal with a stop we would gather with those from the box car and take our supper together. Dinners included fresh bread, sweet milk, a protein, and green, and while the food was not delectable it was more than most of us had seen before so we gobbled it down.

I learned later that many of the children aboard the train were from my ward and that some of them had parents that were alive. They were handed over to strangers for numerous reasons. Some folks were doing hard time in jail, others were drunkards or drug addicts who had fallen prey to the opium dens, the majority, however, were financially incapable of caring for their children. The poverty stricken city produced so much crime resulting from immigration that even those with good intentions handed their flesh and blood to the Sisters hoping they would have a better life in the country. The thirteen year old boy with the lovely singing voice and sunken eyes told me that his mother was a prostitute and could no longer care for him. I held his hand tightly, knowing he felt abandoned and unwanted like I did. I thanked my lucky stars above that I had a good mama who would never sell me out or send me away as long as she was alive. I felt a little remorse towards the girl who I beat up at the Girls’ home because she must not have had any love before and didn’t know just how nice a comfort it was.

As the train rolled along westward we made several stops at churches, opera houses and town halls. Agnes handed out sweets and repeated her instructions, then we cleaned our faces and marched onto the platform where we put on our best show, smiling, being delightful, and praying for a family to want us. Many boys didn’t necessarily want families but rather work and often that is what they were offered. As long as they were fed and had a bed at night the family could adopt them for free in exchange for their labor. The next two boys adopted out went to a mill owner who wished to expand his operation. They were given room and board in exchange for work and seemed quite happy about it, they said their goodbyes to those of us left on the train and started their new lives.

Several more babies and toddlers were adopted by families that would love them as their own. You could see it in the eyes of the new parents, the tenderness they showed when examining their prospective new child, counting their fingers and toes. There was love in their embrace when all the paperwork requirements were met and they were able to take their child home. It was something to marvel at, the way parents just knew which child was meant for them. I couldn’t deny the children this love although I was growing more anxious and insecure as the train traveled west, changing lines from the Erie to the Lackawanna in Chicago.

Edmund was painfully shy and guarded. He gripped my hand tighter than ever and particularly so on the platform. One eager man came towards Eddie, as I had begun to call him. He tried to be friendly and get Eddie to talk before he stuck his dirt-ridden fingers in the little guy’s mouth to examine his teeth. Eddie chomped right down on them, spitting out the yucky residue left from the stranger’s fingers and proceeded to wail so loudly that any attention he called to him or to me for that matter was unwanted. I took Edmund back into the train that afternoon and cuddled him as if he were mine. He was a lovely child once you got past his quirky behaviors, fears, and snotty nose. As long as I had Eddie to care for I would surely never be given a home. But I secretly liked being needed by Eddie and grew to adore him.

I decided to make the Orphan Train my home with Eddie. We were fed and had beds to sleep on at night and had nowhere else to be. I began to sing Eddie the ABC’s and taught him to count to ten. We counted our fingers and toes and he laughed when I pretended I captured his nose. His smile was devilish, and boy was he a squirmy fellow, turning to spaghetti when it was time to change his nappy or change him into his traveling clothes. Agnes had a few children’s books on the train and as I pointed to the pictures Eddie and a few other children would forget where we were headed and just enjoy the moment.

At night we often slept at hotels or in church halls that were prepared for us ahead of time by the Sisters of Charity’s correspondence. The boys and girls were divided and separated into rooms by age and gender. But Eddie and I always slept together. No one else could get him to fall asleep; he needed me to pat his back and rub his hair just so and to sing his favorite lullabies such as ‘Rock a Bye Baby’. He held onto my thumbs with his tiny hands and when I woke in the morning he would be staring adoringly into my eyes.

Agnes was fearful Edmund was growing too attached to me and tried to take him upon herself but he proved to be too much trouble when she had so many other children to chaperone. The older children were growing restless and reported to be smoking and using profanity in the boxcars. One of the teenage boys had plans to jump from the train and run away but he was forced to sit in coach with us until his Christian notions settled in. Agnes quizzed him on bible verses, filled his mind with Christian ways and other nonsense until she was certain he would behave. When he finally made his way back to the boxcar he leapt off and we never saw him again.

One family on our fifth stop inquired about me as they heard I was skilled at laundry. The family was rather wealthy and had three young girls. They had a nanny under their employ but she struggled with the care and keeping of the girls and requested they hire a girl strictly for laundry. I was much too small for their liking and they hated my cropped haircut. Still they poked at my ears and hair, opened my mouth and inspected my teeth and gums as if I were a cattle specimen. They turned my hands over multiple times, looking curiously at my nail beds.

“She will do,” said the predatory woman without ever looking into my eyes that were welling with tears.

“Fine, I will sign the papers, meet me outside dear.” The man with the receding hairline said to his wife who was already walking away into the outdoor sunshine. There was nothing cheerful about her and I would be nothing more than a piece of property to them.

I was about to become indentured to a family that would never love me. What would become of Edmund? I had grown to love this child. He was pointing to all sorts of objects now and reciting them as well as reciting different animals and what sounds they made, “cat, dog, meow, ruff, ruff….”

“Now Mary, I assure you that I will remain in touch. It’s part of my job to follow up and see that you are thriving in your new environment.” Sister Agnes tried comforting me.

“But it’s not a family, as I’d hoped for….” I let my voice trail off.

“I know Mary, I know it isn’t as we hoped, but you will be provided for and have everything you need. You can write to me yourself, we shall be pen pals, would you like that?” She asked.

“I suppose it would be nice. Thank you, Sister Agnes.”

I prepared to say my goodbyes to Edmund, kissing him gently on the cheek and whispering into his tiny ears that I loved him and hoped a nice family would come for him at the next stop. He put his little hands on my cheeks and I heaved a sigh of grief so great that I began throwing up. I threw up all over my good Christian dress and all over Eddie’s suit of clothes. I had chunks of vomit in my hair and on my shoes, I looked into the face of the man who was to take me home and he snarled at me, threw the pen back at Agnes and said, “We’ve changed our minds.” He walked out. I was free to be with Eddie and Agnes for another few days at least.

I don’t know what overcame me that day, perhaps it was the fact we had been traveling for several weeks having gone through New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois and had paraded ourselves desperately in front of strangers, hoping to be wanted. Or perhaps it was my growing love for Edmund who was softening me, either way I was grateful for we only had one more stop before returning back to the city. We only had to go through the flat lands of Iowa and would be turning back around heading east to pick up more orphans. I would be able to stay with the Sisters until our next trip was scheduled.

Our very last stop on the way home was going to be in Mason City, Iowa. I had considered that maybe I could be a ward like Agnes some day and she agreed I would do a fine job. She also agreed it was necessary to find Edmund a nice family home first however, or I would be unable to help her on subsequent trips.

Most of the children had been adopted or exchanged for work at this point in our journey. There were five of us left including me and Eddie, a set of twin girls with criss crossed eyes, and a lad about the age of seven who was sullen and not so bright. The lad repeatedly hit himself in the forehead and screamed out curse words in feverish torrents frightening the smaller children on board.

We donned our finest clothes, Agnes reminded us of our good manners and to smile big for the crowd, then we met up with the coordinating Sister who led us to the Towne Center for our appraisals. Few families had come in to see us but one family that was present was most certainly of the do-gooder variety. They had children of their own but felt it was Christian to adopt a child in need bringing them into the folds of their family showing them the ways of the Lord. The woman of the family held the Holy Bible tightly across her chest while glancing at the five of us before her. She whispered to her husband, a stout man with a neatly manicured mustache that curled up on each end. He pulled out his glasses and put them on his beady eyes glancing closer at the twins. They clasped their hands together and smiled their best smiles that to me seemed to make their eyes cross even more towards their noses. The family walked towards the girls for introductions and soon laughter ensued because the girls learned they were to be adopted by none other than an optometrist who could fit them with glasses to strengthen their eyes and redirect their gaze. They were giddy with excitement and the best of all they weren’t to be separated as other siblings before them had been. The six year old twins ran to say their good byes to Agnes and they hugged Edmund and me as well before skipping off hand in hand with their new parents.

I smiled inside my heart because if two little girls with mousy hair and criss crossed eyes can get a family to love them then surely Edmund and I could. We just haven’t found them yet, or rather, they haven’t found us.

The last three of us unclaimed children boarded the train with Agnes and headed back to New York City. I was looking forward to the hustle and bustle of the city after seeing so much boring countryside. The possibility that I might see Scotty again loomed large within me. I liked him, he was my one and only true friend in the city. I thought maybe he could ride the next train bound west with me and find a place of his own or at least good honest work that he could be paid for doing. Scotty had a tough exterior but I suspected he was soft on the inside like the rest of us.

Our train pulled into the New York City Grand Central Station and rather than being met by large crowds milling about, kids selling the papers and or matches, we were met with emptiness.

“What’s this?” Sister Agnes asked, searching the barren station.

Spring brought a substantial rise and resurgence of cholera while we were traveling, the newspaper described it as an epidemic similar to the outbreak of 1831, one that took thousands of lives. Panic ensued. The widespread disease began taking lives shortly after we left on the orphan train. The Sisters remained healthy but many of the children from the slums were sickly or passed away. People in stagecoaches, livery coaches, or on horseback were leaving the city in droves. Inhabitants were forewarned not to eat or drink too heartily and not to sleep anywhere where there could be a draft. Posters lined the train station telling people to tend immediately to problems of the bowels and not to take any medicine without doctor’s advice, not to get wet, and or drink cold water. Yet no one knew what really caused the cholera; only that it spread.