Chestina Bowker Allen traveled to Kansas Territory from Roxbury, Massachusetts, with her husband, Asahel Gilbert Allen, and five children--William, Charles, Henrietta, John, and Abbie. Members of the third company sent by the New England Emigrant Aid Company, the Allens began the journey to Kansas Territory in October, 1854. The journal is a record of their journey to the Kansas Territory, and of their first three years there (1854-1858). Mrs. Allen described their journey west with stops in Kansas City and Lawrence before eventually settling near Rock Creek in Pottawatomie County. She wrote about many of her daily activities, including assisting neighbors when ill, a cholera epidemic in the area in 1855, descriptions of Native Americans she saw, and various rumors and encounters with fellow free state supporters and proslavery groups. She provided a great deal of information about living conditions and the price and availability of various goods. She wrote about her husband and older sons going to various communities to work, and also about people who visited their home and/or who boarded with them. [The document appears to be recopied from an original diary, and includes some penciled-in corrections and a few annotations from a later time.]

Creator: Allen, Chestina Bowker, b. 1808
Date: October 17, 1854 to April 22, 1858