Noble Deeds Of American Women Part 5

SPRAGUE.

Ladies, you deserve To have a temple built _you_.

SHAKSPEARE.

The Bunker Hill Monument a.s.sociation was incorporated in June, 1823.

Nothing further was done that year. At the second annual meeting, which was held on the seventeenth of June, efficient plans were devised to carry forward the enterprise; and at the end of another year, just half a century after the battle, the corner stone was laid. General Lafayette was then on a visit to the United States, and was appropriately chosen to take a leading part in this interesting ceremony. The monument did not get fairly under way till the spring of 1827. This apparent tardiness was owing to the circ.u.mstance that the material was to be brought from a granite quarry in Quincy, and a rail road--the first in the United States--had to be built from the quarry to the wharf in Quincy to convey the stone.

In 1828, the funds were exhausted, and the work was not resumed till 1834. Within a year the work was again suspended for the same cause.

Nothing further was done, and but little said, till 1839, when it was announced that two gentlemen--Amos Lawrence, Esq., of Boston, and Judah Truro, Esq., of New Orleans--would give ten thousand each, provided a sum sufficient to complete the monument could be raised. This liberal offer caused some momentary stimulation; but no proposal immediately made was deemed expedient.

The affairs of the a.s.sociation now wore, as they had done once or twice before, a gloomy aspect. In the annual report, made on the seventeenth of June, 1840, doubts were expressed whether the present generation would see the monument completed. The same discouraging remark was made soon after, in one of the sewing circles of Boston, when, instead of depressing the spirits, it raised the ambition and quickened the thoughts of the ladies, and several of them proposed to get up a Fair.

It was a happy suggestion; was forthwith sanctioned by the board of directors; prompted the issuing of a circular by a sub-committee of the same; raised the stentorian voice of a free and patriotic press, and met with immediate favor all over the land.

The ladies had moved in the matter--_had taken the work into their own hands_--and all doubts in regard to its speedy completion seemed to vanish. The Fair was announced to be held in Quincy Hall, Boston, to commence on the fifth of September, 1840 Every female in the land was invited to contribute some article of her own hands' production, to the exhibition. The patriotic spirit of the _mothers_ of the Revolution was now warm in the hearts of their _daughters_, and ten thousand hands, engaged in the work of preparation, were "plying the needle with exquisite art."

The ladies were to have the complete management of the Fair; and, all things in readiness, it commenced. The product of so much industry and ingenuity, dispensed at the hands of the ladies, presented a scene to the thousands who gathered around the numerous well-stored tables, that is described by a writer--doubtless an eye-witness--as "brilliant and inspiring."[12]

[12] Frothingham's Siege of Boston.

The Fair continued till the fifteenth of the month. Its success was chronicled from day to day in a journal called "The Monument," printed in the Hall. It was the grandest movement of the kind ever made in the country; was conducted throughout in the most admirable manner, and wound up in triumph. Its net proceeds were $30,035 50. To this sum and the $20,000 pledged by the two gentlemen before mentioned, was soon added enough, from other sources, to make the fund $55,153 27; and the work went on to its completion.[13] Thus, at length, a "duty had been performed;" this imperishable offering to Freedom, "which had its commencement in manly patriotism," was "crowned by garlands of grace and beauty."

[13] The last stone was raised on the morning of the twenty-third of July, 1842; the government of the a.s.sociation and a mult.i.tude of other people were present on the occasion. Just before this act took place, a cannon was raised to the apex and discharged--a morning salute to call the people together to engage in the matins of Freedom. Edward Carnes, Jr., of Charlestown, accompanied the stone in its ascent, waving the American flag as he went up, and the Charlestown Artillery were meanwhile firing salutes to announce to the surrounding country the interesting event.

LYDIA DARRAH.

The brave man is not he who feels no fear, For that were stupid and irrational; But he whose n.o.ble soul its fear subdues, And bravely dares the danger nature shrinks from.

JOANNA BAILLIE.

We find the following anecdote of the amiable and heroic Quakeress, Lydia Darrah, in the first number of the American Quarterly Review:

When the British army held possession of Philadelphia, General Howe's head quarters were in Second street, the fourth door below Spruce, in a house which was before occupied by General Cadwalader. Directly opposite, resided William and Lydia Darrah, members of the Society of Friends. A superior officer of the British army, believed to be the Adjutant General, fixed upon one of their chambers, a back room, for private conference; and two of them frequently met there, with fire and candles, in close consultation. About the second of December, the Adjutant General told Lydia that they would be in the room at seven o'clock, and remain late; and that they wished the family to retire early to bed; adding, that when they were going away, they would call her to let them out, and extinguish their fire and candles. She accordingly sent all the family to bed; but, as the officer had been so particular, her curiosity was excited. She took off her shoes, and put her ear to the key-hole of the conclave. She overheard an order read for all the British troops to march out, late in the evening of the fourth, and attack General Was.h.i.+ngton's army, then encamped at White Marsh. On hearing this, she returned to her chamber and laid herself down. Soon after, the officers knocked at her door, but she rose only at the third summons, having feigned to be asleep. Her mind was so much agitated that, from this moment, she could neither eat nor sleep; supposing it to be in her power to save the lives of thousands of her countrymen; but not knowing how she was to convey the necessary information to General Was.h.i.+ngton, nor daring to confide it even to her husband. The time left, was, however, short; she quickly determined to make her way, as soon as possible, to the American outposts. She informed her family, that, as they were in want of flour, she would go to Frankfort for some; her husband insisted that she should take with her the servant maid; but, to his surprise, she positively refused. She got access to General Howe, and solicited--what he readily granted,--a pa.s.s through the British troops on the lines. Leaving her bag at the mill, she hastened towards the American lines, and encountered on her way an American, Lieutenant Colonel Craig, of the light horse, who, with some of his men, was on the look-out for information. He knew her, and inquired whither she was going. She answered, in quest of her son, an officer in the American army; and prayed the Colonel to alight and walk with her. He did so, ordering his troops to keep in sight. To him she disclosed her momentous secret, after having obtained from him the most solemn promise never to betray her individually, since her life might be at stake, with the British. He conducted her to a house near at hand, directed a female in it to give her something to eat, and he speeded for head quarters, where he brought General Was.h.i.+ngton acquainted with what he had heard.

Was.h.i.+ngton made, of course, all preparation for baffling the meditated surprise. Lydia returned home with her flour; sat up alone to watch the movement of the British troops; heard their footsteps; but when they returned, in a few days after, did not dare to ask a question, though solicitous to learn the event. The next evening, the Adjutant General came in, and requested her to walk up to his room, as he wished to put some questions. She followed him in terror; and when he locked the door, and begged her, with an air of mystery to be seated, she was sure that she was either suspected, or had been betrayed. He inquired earnestly whether any of her family were up the last night he and the other officer met:--she told him that they all retired at eight o'clock. He observed--"I know _you_ were asleep, for I knocked at your chamber door three times before you heard me;--I am entirely at a loss to imagine who gave General Was.h.i.+ngton information of our intended attack, unless the walls of the house could speak. When we arrived near White Marsh, we found all their cannon mounted, and the troops prepared to receive us; and we have marched back like a parcel of fools."

WIDOW STOREY.[14]

Stick to your aim; the mongrel's hold will slip, But only crow-bars loose the bull-dog's lip; Small as he looks, the jaw that never yields, Drags down the bellowing monarch of the fields.

HOLMES.

The first man who commenced a settlement in the town of Salisbury, Vermont, on the Otter creek, was Amos Storey, who, in making an opening in the heart of the wilderness on the right of land to which the first settler was ent.i.tled, was killed by the fall of a tree. His widow, who had been left in Connecticut, immediately resolved to push into the wilderness, with her ten small children, to take his place and preserve and clear up his farm. And this bold resolution she carried out to the letter, in spite of every difficulty, hards.h.i.+p and danger which for years constantly beset her in her solitary location in the woods. Acre after acre of the dense and dark forest melted away before her axe, which she handled with the dexterity of the most experienced chopper.

The logs and bushes were piled and burnt by her own strong and untiring hand: crops were raised, by which, with the fruits of her fis.h.i.+ng and unerring rifle, she supported herself and her hardy brood of children.

As a place of refuge from the a.s.saults of Indians or dangerous wild beasts, she dug out an underground room, into which, through a small entrance made to open under an overhanging thicket in the bank of the stream, she nightly retreated with her children. And here she continued to reside, thus living and thus laboring, una.s.sisted, till, by her own hand and the help which her boys soon began to afford her, she cleared up a valuable farm and placed herself in independent circ.u.mstances in life.

[14] For this anecdote and that of Mrs. Hendee, we are indebted to the Hon. Daniel P. Thompson, of Montpelier, author of "The Green Mountain Boys," "Locke Amsden," &c. In a note to the author, in a letter which contained these anecdotes, he appropriately observes that "the women of the Green Mountains deserve as much credit for their various displays of courage, endurance and patriotism, in the early settlement of their State, as was ever awarded to their s.e.x for similar exhibitions in any part of the world. In the controversy with New York and New Hamps.h.i.+re, which took the form of war in many instances; in the predatory Indian incursions, and in the war of the Revolution, they often displayed a capacity for labor and endurance, a spirit and firmness in the hour of danger, and a resolution and hardihood in defending their families, and their threatened land against all enemies, whether domestic or foreign, that would have done honor to the dames of Sparta."

MRS. HENDEE.

I am their mother, who shall bar me from them.

SHAKSPEARE.

On the burning of Royalton, Vermont, by the Indians, in 1776, Mrs.

Hendee, of that place, exhibited a praiseworthy and heroic character.

The attack was sudden, and her husband being absent in the Vermont regiment, and she being in the field, the Indians seized her children, carried them across White river, at that place perhaps an hundred yards wide and quite deep for fording, and placed them under the keepers having the other persons they had collected, thirty or forty in number, in charge. On discovering the fate of her children, Mrs. Hendee resolutely dashed into the river, waded through, and fearlessly entering the Indian camp, regardless of their tomahawks menacingly flourished round her head, boldly demanded the release of her little ones, and persevered in her alternate upbraidings and supplications, till her request was granted. She then carried her children back through the river and landed them in safety on the other bank. But not content with what she had done, like a patriot, as she was, she immediately returned, begged for the release of the children of others; again was rewarded with success, and brought two or three more away; again returned and again succeeded, till she had rescued the whole fifteen of her neighbors' children who had been thus s.n.a.t.c.hed away from their distracted parents. On her last return to the camp of the enemy, the Indians were so struck with her conduct that one of them declared that so brave a squaw deserved to be carried across the river, and offered to take her on his back and carry her over. She, in the same spirit, accepted the offer, mounted the back of the gallant savage, was carried to the opposite bank, where she collected her rescued troop of children, and hastened away to restore them to their over-joyed parents.

PATRIOTIC WOMEN OF OLD MIDDLEs.e.x.

In the radiant front superior s.h.i.+nes That first paternal virtue, public zeal, Who throws o'er all an equal wide survey, And, ever musing on the common weal, Still labors glorious with some great design.

THOMSON.

"Old Middles.e.x" being our native county, with peculiar pleasure and some local pride, we record the following anecdote. Should the historical ploughshare be driven through the other towns in the county, and the towns generally of Ma.s.sachusetts, it would turn up similar gems in abundance, "of purest ray serene." We quote from Butler's History of Groton:

"After the departure of Colonel Prescott's regiment of 'minute-men,'

Mrs. David Wright, of Pepperell, Mrs. Job Shattuck, of Groton, and the neighboring women, collected at what is now Jewett's Bridge, over the Nashua, between Pepperell and Groton, clothed in their absent husbands'

apparel, and armed with muskets, pitchforks, and such other weapons as they could find; and having elected Mrs. Wright their commander, resolutely determined that no foe to freedom, foreign or domestic, should pa.s.s that bridge. For rumors were rife, that the regulars were approaching and frightful stories of slaughter flew rapidly from place to place, and from house to house.

"Soon there appeared one[15] on horseback, supposed to be treasonably engaged in conveying intelligence to the enemy. By the implicit command of Sergeant Wright, he is immediately arrested, unhorsed, searched, and the treasonable correspondence found concealed in his boots. He was detained prisoner, and sent to Oliver Prescott, Esq., of Groton, and his dispatches were sent to the Committee of Safety."

[15] Captain Leonard Whiting, of Hollis, N. H., a noted tory, who was the bearer of dispatches from Canada to the British in Boston.

THE CACIQUE'S n.o.bLE DAUGHTER.

I think of thee, sweet lady, as of one Too pure to mix with others, like some star, s.h.i.+ning in pensive beauty all alone, Kindred with those around, yet brighter far.

MRS. WELBY.