Following ten years of hard work, at the age of 26, Swen began correspondence with a Swedish girl in New York City. Though Johanna Anderson’s job as a housemaid took much of her time, she always found a way to write long thoughtful letters to Swen in far away Texas.
The Civil War erupted. In spite of the hostile and desperate condition of the country, Johanna was able to travel by stagecoach from Union territory onto Southern soil in 1863. The couple married and settled forty miles west of Austin outside of Johnson City on a small parcel of land Swen had purchased.
Like many new European immigrants, Swen and Johanna favored the Union. Living in a Southern state, their stanch support of Yankees made peaceful co-existence among their neighbors difficult. Nonetheless, they made it through the war and reconstruction era and their little farm thrived until the winter of 1878 when tragedy struck.
One brisk mid-November day Swen Beryman and three comrades were riding along the base of the awesome Devil’s Backbone, headed in the direction of the eerie double peaks known then as Long Man Mountain and Long Woman Mountain rising fourteen hundred feet above the Texas plain. At that time evidence of ancient Indian shrines was still visible on the zenith of each mountain.
The remains of Native Americans who inhabited the land long before the Texans were plentiful throughout the Hill Country. There was much superstition and some fear among the settlers who found themselves in the area of these sacred Indian sites and shrines littered throughout the countryside. No area in the Hill Country generated as much superstition, though, as the row of rolling hills known today as Devil’s Backbone. This spiritual core of Native American worship is where Swen and his companions found themselves that fateful day.
As late afternoon approached, the group experienced an uncommon natural phenomenon.
The sky turned black and the temperature began to drop rapidly just as the trail leading up to the top of Long Woman Mountain came into sight. Lightning flashed and hail pelted them as a storm settled above the small group of men. At the base of the impressive incline the horses began to spook and all but Swen became frightened. The men were already in a state of anxiety, unnerved by the unexplainable events told by those who dared to traverse the once sacred hill. As they insisted on turning back, Swen laughed at their irrational fear and continued on. Ascending the sloping trail alone, thunder began to crash, the wind bit into his skin, and the temperature continued to plummet. Swen was forced to dismount and find shelter among the rocks and thicket, huddling there all night.
Concerned because Swen had not returned to their campsite as the sun crested the horizon the next morning, his friends found the courage to climb the hill and look for him. They found him tucked in his meager shelter, but not soon enough. The temperature on the hill had dropped so low that frostbite had set in and Swen’s lower appendages were frozen. By the time they had transported him to the local doctor, it was too late. The doctor had no choice but to saw off the damaged legs to prevent gangrene from claiming Swen’s life.
Swen survived the double amputation at a time when many men did not, and later he worked in two artificial wooden legs. Although his wooden legs allowed him to walk, he could not keep up with the responsibilities a ranch required. He sold the ranch and moved his wife and children to Oatmanville where he purchased a general store; a store that still stands today as the headquarters of Madrone Coffee Company.
Author Jeanine Plumer
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