Pylant Geneology

In 1933 David wrote an article called "Then and Now" describing life as it was lived when he was a small boy. In one part he described the winter of 1858: "there came a snow three feet deep and sleet on top so a man and dog could walk on top of the snow."
The Federals came and captured my father (Samuel Moore Hufstedler, Sr.) and gave him his choice to take the Oath of Allegiance or go with them as a prisoner of war. He took the oath and it meant death if he was ever caught in arms against the North again. They wrote down his name, weight, height, color of his eyes and hair. Then in about a year a man by the name of John Mitchell made up a Rifle Company of Rebels and he had to join it or they would have conscripted him. So there he was. They took him about 50 miles from home and then he left them and came home and hid out for the rest of the war. We carried him his grub about a mile. I didn't think he did anything wrong.
The war had not been on long till our salt played out. Then everybody dug up the dirt from their smokehouses where the meat had dripped and put the dirt in a hopper like an ash hopper, poured water on it and boiled down the dirty water to make salt. When that played out six or eight of us went to Cape Girardeau, Missouri for salt and got only one bushel to the family. On the way back at the St. Francis River robbers took everything we had but our salt. We had a lot of coffee, dry goods, domestic, shoes, hats and calico, for that was what they wore in those days.
We was water bound at St. Francis (Arkansas) for about three days. We took logs and hauled them to the river and nailed them together to make a raft. We took our ox lines and made a rope to pull the raft back and forth. Then took our wagons over, unyoked the oxen, took our yokes over on the raft. We swam seven yoke of oxen and some of the boys crossed over to yoke the steers as rthey came out of the water. There was a big snow on the ground and it was the coldest weather I ever saw. Our bed would freeze to the ground. I was about 16 years old.
(A Host of Huffstutlers and Huffstetlers, Huffstickler, Huffstedleers by Faryl I. Fleming.)

David and Delphia moved from Arkansas to Texas probably along with the other members of his family who moved there in the 1890s. They had 8 children, some of whom died in Texas. They were probably all born in Randolph Co, AR.