By Henry M. Holden

Ever wondered how early American pioneers survived daily? Colonial settlers had a simple but hearty diet, shaped by their environment and limited resources. Their meals were often based on locally available ingredients, with staples like corn, wheat, and game meat. Understanding their meals gives us insight into the challenges and traditions of early American life.

The daily meals of colonial settlers were simple but nourishing, reflecting their environment and resources. From cornmeal porridge to roasted game, their diet was a testament to resilience and ingenuity. While modern diets offer more variety, understanding colonial meals gives us a deeper appreciation for early American life. Absent was processed foods, artificial ingredients, preparation, grilling and microwave cooking.

 When the first settlers arrived in New Jersey, they found the area rich with wildlife valuable and at the same time, others that were dangerous. Roasted or boiled meat deer, turkey, or pork were common. Large herds of deer, especially in the central part of the State lived alongside beavers, rabbits , and squirrels. More threatening animals included bears, panthers, wolves, wildcats, and rattlesnakes. Based on the spread of humans to populate the unsettled lands these animals still exist today but in greatly reduced numbers. Foxes were also common and often damaged settlers’ poultry pens. Because some animals caused so much damage, bounties were offered for the head or carcass of dead panthers, foxes, bears, coyotes and other indigenous and dangerous animals.

The settlers found New Jersey a rich hunting ground. Nothing, however, is said about hunting in the early days.  New Jersey details the accounts for fishing in the fresh waters of New Jersey. Soon after the settlement of Burlington, (1677) one of the townspeople wrote to his friends in England, describing the way the people fished in this new land.

“The Delaware River is teaming with fish, and in the spring, it swarmed with herring.”

 When the early Burlington settlers wanted to catch herring, they did not trouble themselves with nets, or hooks and lines, but they built in the shallow water near the shore a pen, or, as they called it, a “pinfold,” made by driving stakes into the sand creating a circular space about six feet in diameter.

On the side toward the open water an opening was left; and a big bush was prepared to close it up when the proper time arrived.

The fishermen waded into the water, carrying with them great birch bushes. Sweeping the water with these bushes , they slowly advanced toward the pinfold, driving swarms of herring before them, and so surrounding the panicked fish, that they had no way of escape, except by rushing through the entrance of the pinfold.

Into the  enclosure the slippery creatures came, pushing, crowding, and dashing over each other, until the pen was packed with fish, jammed together like sardines in a can. Then the bush was driven down into the opening; and all that was necessary to do was to dip into the pinfold and take out large handfuls of fish. In this method bushels of herring could be secured at one time.

In those days game fishing did not exist to any extent; that is, sportsmen did not go out with rods and flies to catch fish one at a time, when it was so easy to scoop them up by the dozens.

Shad, too, was very plentiful in those days, but not so highly valued as now. In fact, when the settlers became more numerous, and the herring fewer, these fish were held in higher regard than shad; so that, when a man bought one hundred herring, he was expected to take ninety-five herring and five shad, or something in that quantity.

In those early days there were denizens of the deep waters on the shores of New Jersey. They were much more valuable than herring, shad, or any other creatures with fins, no matter how dense they might present themselves. These were whales, of which there were large numbers of them in Delaware Bay, and even some distance up the river.

When the Dutch first came into these waters, they came after whales; and even at the present day one of these boundless water monsters occasionally investigates the western coast of New Jersey, generally paying fatally for its curiosity.

There were a great many snakes, many of them rattlesnakes, especially in the hilly country. The early settlers had a curious way of making themselves safe from these snakes. When they were going to trek through the woods, or along a wild country road, where they expected to find snakes, they would take with them several hogs.

The hunters would drive these grunting animals in front of them. Hogs are very fond of eating snakes, and as they went along, they would devour all they met. It did not matter to the hogs whether the snakes were poisonous or harmless, they ate them all; for even the most venomous rattlesnake has little chance against a pig in good condition, who, with its coat of bristles and the thick lining of fat under its skin, is so well protected against the fangs of the snake, that he pays no more attention to them than we to the seeds of a strawberry when we are eating one.

Rattlesnakes were the most dangerous wild animals with which the early settlers had to compete; because they were very numerous, and their bite, if not treated properly and at once, was generally fatal. The Natives, who knew the habits of the snake, were not nearly as afraid of it as were the whites.

To protect oneself against these creatures, unless there are too many of them, it is only necessary to make enough noise to let the snake know that someone is approaching. It is also time for humans to get out of the way as fast as possible. If the human the  does not have time to do this, the snake will coil itself up and springs its rattle, thus giving notice that it is on hand, and ready to strike.

My Scout Master made it mandatory for each scout to carry two empty metal food containers. The Scout Master would not let any scout into the woods with out seeing that the cans were tied to the upper thigh and small rocks placed inside the can. Each step the scout took announced his presence near by the noise of the rocks in the cans. As a result, our troop never had a snake bite to treat.

It has often been said that the snake’s rattle is a warning to birds and other animals; but this is now known to be untrue.  For, when a snake rattles, it strikes its victim almost at the same time, if it has a chance.

It is now believed that the rattle is used to attract the attention of birds and other small creatures; and when they turn and look into the eyes of the dreadful serpent, they are so overcome with terror that they cannot fly away and soon become its prey. This is commonly called snake charming; and a great many instances of it are related by people who are in the habit of telling the truth, and who have seen a snake charm a bird which could have flown away just as well as not, had it not been for the terrible attraction of those great eyes, which drew it nearer and nearer, until at last it found itself in the jaws of the snake.

The Natives did not give this significance to the rattle: they believed, as many people now do, that it was merely used as a warning. So, when a Native met with a snake which rattled before he came up to it, he took it to be a snake of honest, straight-forward principles, who wished to deceive nobody, and therefore gave fair notice of its presence. Such a serpent was never molested. But if a snake rattled after a Native had passed, the Native went back and killed the creature, on the ground that it was a sneak and a coward, which had neglected to give warning to the passer-by.

A farmer living in Cumberland County tells a story about having discovered an island in a swamp, which so abounded in snakes, that he and some of his neighbors conceived the idea that this was the place where they made their headquarters. In summertime, they wandered to forage upon the country. The farmers waited until winter before they made an attack on this stronghold; and then they came and dug up the ground, knowing that these reptiles always pass the cold season in a sleepy state underground.

It was not long before they came to what might be called a cold storage vault. This was a flat-bottomed cavity, filled to the depth of about three to four inches with clear spring water; and in this water were packed away a great number of snakes, evenly laid side by side, so, as to take up as little room as possible. Most of these creatures were rattlesnakes; but there were black snakes among them. Besides these, there were, as the writer expressed it, at least a pack of spring frogs; these having probably crawled in to fill up all corners and vacant places. All these reptiles were of course dormant and insensible and were easily destroyed.

There is another story which gives a better idea of the abundance of rattlesnakes in the new colony. In a quarry, from which the workmen were removing  stone for the foundations of Princeton College, (later University) a wide crack in the rocks was discovered, which led downward to a large cavity; and in this cave were found about twenty bushels of rattlesnake bones. There was no reason to believe that this was a snake cemetery, to which these creatures retired when they supposed they were approaching the end of their days; but it was, without doubt, a great rattlesnake trap. The winding narrow passage leading to it must have been very attractive to a snake seeking retired quarters in which to take his long winter nap. Although the cave at the bottom of the great crack was easy enough to get into, it was so arranged that it was difficult, if not impossible, for a snake to get out of it, especially in the spring, when these creatures are very thin and weak, having been nourished all winter by their own fat. Thus, year after year, the rattlesnakes must have gone down into that cavity, without knowing that they could never get out again.

The great rivals of the herring and other fish in the rivers of New Jersey (and the snakes in their winter quarters underground), were the wild pigeons.

Several times in the year the settlers would be visited by vast flocks of wild pigeons , which came in such numbers as to shut out the light of the sun, as if there had been clouds in the sky. They would remain in one place for a few days and then move on. As it was unnecessary to use hooks and lines to catch a few fish out of the multitudes which swarmed in the streams, it was hardly worthwhile wasting gun powder and lead shot on the vast flocks of pigeons that visited New Jersey in those days. When they came to roost in the forests, they could be knocked down with poles and stones; and thousands of them were obtained by the men and boys, who they found them very good eating.

There was a summer in which the settlers were very much astonished by the advent of a vast army of invaders to which they were not accustomed. These were locusts, probably the kind we now call seventeen-year locusts; and the people were amazed to see these creatures come up out of the ground, clad in their horny coat of armor , which they later cast off, when they appear as winged creatures.

They could not understand how insects burdened by such hard, unwieldy shells could penetrate to such distance below the surface of the earth. They did not know that each one of these locusts came from a little worm which had dropped into the ground many years before, and which had worked its way down to a great depth, and then, about sixty-five years later had reappeared on the surface to split its back, and get out of its shell. It spends a few days flying around in the summer air, lay its eggs in the twigs of trees, and then, having fulfilled its duties on Earth, then dies.

Although the farmers probably thought that their crops would be eaten up by this vast horde of locusts, this did not happen, and no great injury was to happen. Locusts do not appear on earth to destroy crops and vegetation. These creatures are far different from the grasshopper-like locusts which invade our Western countries, sometimes devastating large sections of farming lands.