CHAPTER I_Donald McElroy, Scotch Irishman

E-text prepared by Chris Curnow, Michael, Mary Meehan, and the Online

Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net)

Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this

file which includes the original illustrations.

See 36282-h.htm or 36282-h.zip:

(https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/36282/pg36282-images.html)

(https://www.gutenberg.org/files/36282/36282-h.zip)

DONALD McELROY

SCOTCH IRISHMAN

W. W. CALDWELL

Illustrated by Frank T. Merrill

Philadelphia

George W. Jacobs & Company

Publishers

George W. Jacobs & Company

Printed in U. S. A.

[Illustration: NELLY STOOD READY TO RECEIVE THE GENERAL.]

ILLUSTRATIONS

Nelly stood ready to receive the General

I laid the floral wreath carefully upon the bright curls

"You have evidently mistaken me for a villain"

"Cousin Donald! Colonel Clark!" she called sharply

CHAPTER I

The life story of most men, who have lived earnest and active lives,

would doubtless be worth the hearing, if the various influences and the

many vicissitudes which compose it could be separated and skillfully

rearranged into some well wrought design. As I look back upon my own

life, it seems to me full of interest and instruction, yet I suppose not

more so than that of many another; wherefore, were personal experiences

and conclusions the sum of it, I should hesitate to write them down,

lest those events and struggles which to me have seemed notable and

significant, should prove in the telling of them to have been but

commonplace incidents to which all are liable. Because of the accident

of my birth in the year 1754, however, I have lived through a period

which will be ever memorable in the history of the world--a period so

crowded with worthy deeds and great men, especially on this continent,

that there is small danger its interest will be soon exhausted. Do not

conclude that I intend to venture upon a tale of the American

Revolution; only a master's hand can fill in with due skill and

proportion so wide a canvas, and that story waits. Where my own life's

story has been entangled with some of the events of that struggle I must

touch upon them, and the real purpose of my narrative--which is to

chronicle for future generations the noble part played in the great

drama of the nation's making by a certain worthy people--will require me

to review briefly a few of the battles and campaigns of our war against

autocracy.

The Scotch Irish of America, through the commendable habit of that race,

so it be not carried too far, to put their strength into deeds rather

than into words, have missed their meed of credit for the important work

they did in our struggle for liberty. Now, our honored fellow-countrymen

and co-patriots, the Puritans, have not made this mistake; they took

their part in action nobly, and also they have taken care to record in

history, song, and story the might and glory of their deeds. The "Boston

Tea Party" and the "Boston Massacre" will go down emblazoned on the page

of history, but the fight at Alamance, and the vehement petitions urging

resistance to tyranny sent up to state conventions, and the first

Congress, by the Scotch Irish counties of Virginia, North Carolina, and

Pennsylvania have scarcely been heard of.

It is my hope not only to show what the Scotch Irish have done for the

cause of liberty, but also to give a just idea of the character of this

people, a true picture of their home life, and a correct estimate of

that religion which is so dear to them, and which has had so much to do

with making them the freedom-loving, and withal broad-minded patriots

they are. Few men, I flatter myself, are better equipped to tell a

Scotch Irish story than I, Donald McElroy, who in blood am pure blue

Scotch Irish, who have been instructed by Scotch Irish divines in things

temporal and spiritual, have fought under Scotch Irish leaders, and

lived all my life among them: yet I think I may promise that my story

shall not be a mere idyl--a panegyric of a people, all whose virtues

will be exaggerated, all whose faults will be slurred, or kept out of

sight. I have seen too much of life not to know that for each height

there is a shadow, that every noble trait of character is closely

attended by a special weakness. I know the faults of my people as I know

their virtues, and through one dearer to me than all else the world

holds, I have suffered much from that narrowness of view and

stubbornness of purpose peculiar to some of them.

My boyhood was spent within the bounds of our own plantation, in the

valley of Virginia. Rarely was I allowed to venture beyond sight of the

house unless in company with my father, or some of the negro slaves;

then only to the plow lands, or the harvest fields, until I had learned

the use of rifle, knife and tomahawk. After that I was permitted to hunt

in the forest, being solemnly charged each time by my mother that I

should not go more than a few hundred yards into the woods in any

direction, nor be lured by deer or squirrel into the thickets. There

might be Indians lurking in the bushes any day, and the youthfulness of

a scalp did not impair its value. Later, when I could ride and run like

an Indian, and shoot a bounding deer through the heart, at a distance of

three hundred feet, I was not admonished so frequently, and used often

to hunt alone the day long, coming home at twilight, my horse strung

round with many kinds of game.

All this time with my uncle's eldest son, Thomas, I was being taught

English, Greek, Latin and Mathematics by an old Scotchman, who had

become one of my grandfather's household before the family left

Pennsylvania. He was a fellow of Edinburgh University, and but for the

disabilities of encroaching age was well fitted to bestow upon us all

the education we could imbibe.

Among the incidents of my boyhood, two stand out with peculiar

distinctness. Both were fraught with terrible danger, and yet, as they

come back to me, I realize with something of astonishment that except

for one brief moment, on each occasion, I felt only a sensation of

exhilarating excitement and grim determination. By living in the midst

of hourly peril, we pioneers were dulled to the sense of it. Our one

thought when peril overtook us was to do our utmost, in the full

assurance that the God of our fathers, who miraculously had preserved us

through so many dangers, would again interpose for our deliverance. In

such faith, and naught else could have served them, my mother went

singing about her work, and my father stood guard, alone, over his

slaves, day after day, as they felled the timber on the hill slopes, in

sight of the mountain pass through which the Indians were accustomed to

raid our valley, without cause or warning.

This Saturday afternoon, in the fall of the year, I had gone hunting

afoot. In hot pursuit after a deer, I penetrated a thicket deep in the

forest, there to lose track of my game. But in making my way out, came

full upon a panther's burrow, and so much admired the one striped and

mottled cub curled therein, that the fancy seized me to carry it home

and attempt to tame it. Hearing no sound of the parent beast, I put the

sleeping cub into my game bag, and started homeward. Scarcely half a

mile had been covered when there came from the thicket behind me that

nerve-shaking cry of the panther, resembling nothing else so much as the

scream of a child in mortal terror. My steady gait quickened into a run.

A second screech came from the pursuing panther. Knowledge of my danger

lent wings to my limbs, but the beast gained on me with long leaps of

her agile body. Louder and louder sounded her oft repeated cries, and

the cub in my bag answered with pitiable whines. I could hear her deep,

swift panting, and the soft thud of her feet upon the leafy ground. The

open field was gained but a few yards in advance of her, and turning to

face my foe a sudden panic seized me. To my amazement she paused at the

edge of the forest, and, after turning a scornful glance in my

direction, fixed a meditative eye upon a sunset more gorgeous than

usual. With that alertness of observation, and acuteness of

consciousness which most persons experience in moments of high tension,

I remember noting the rich coloring of the tan and brown rings on the

creature's sleek and mottled skin, and of thinking what a fine, soft

cover it would make for my mother's rocking chair.

Suddenly the panther turned toward me, uttering a still more

blood-curdling cry, and crouched for a spring. My ball met her as she

rose, but only to sting her, and make her the more furious. Her body

came against mine with the force of a cannon ball, and I went down under

it, my unloaded rifle being hurled from my hand. Fastened by the

animal's claws, together we rolled over and over in the dry, matted

grass of the meadow, struggling desperately.

The confused, doubtful struggle was presently over and not only was I

alive and fully conscious, but could even move my mangled arm, and stand

upon my feet. The hilt of my knife stuck straight upward in the long fur

upon the creature's breast, and I pulled it out, wiped it upon the

grass, and sheathed it, thinking I would not use it again, but keep it

for remembrance.

Again I was struck by the thickness and beauty of the panther's skin,

and wished to have it for my mother's chair. It was my custom to carry a

leathern thong in the outer pouch of my game bag; one end of it I now

fastened about the beast's body, the other about my own, and so dragged

the carcass after me across the level field. Slow and painful was my

progress, for my lacerated shoulder and arm smarted maddeningly, and

every few yards I was forced to drop upon the ground to rest.

The full moon was two hours high, when, at last, I came to the barn yard

stile, on which my father leaned, scanning the fields anxiously.

"Well, son, I'm glad you've come," said my father, "your mother is half

dead with anxiety."

I showed my trophy and told my story.

"You did a foolish thing, Don, when you stole the cub, but your mother

need have, I think, little further anxiety about you; you are as able to

take care of yourself as any seasoned woodsman."

The glow of pride my father's words gave me changed to a feeling of

remorse when I saw my mother's blanched face and trembling hands. She

would not consent to let me tame the cub. "Our lives were already close

enough to savagery," she said, "with Indians and wild beasts likely to

fall upon us at any moment; we do not want the sweet peace of our home

broken by any savage sight or sound." She kept the skin, though, used it

on her winter rocking chair, and prized it highly. Indeed I have more

than once overheard her tell how she came by it.

The second incident of my youth most vividly stamped upon my memory

happened just ten months after I killed the panther.

The occasion was the last Indian raid into our valley. Fortunately we

had two days' warning, and in that time the women and children were

gathered within the recently completed stockade around the church, with

provisions enough for a week's siege. Meanwhile the men took their

rifles and marched to the mountain pass through which the Indians were

expected to enter the valley, hoping to turn the savages back with a

bloody lesson such as would last them a while, and insure us some more

years of peace.

Much exalted in my own opinion by my recent exploit with the panther, I

begged to go with the men, and took it somewhat sullenly that I should

be left behind with the rest of the youths, under the captaincy of the

parson, to guard a church full of women and children. About half an hour

before sunset on the second day I was descending the hill behind the

church to the spring, a piggin in either hand, and my ever present rifle

under my arm, when I saw on the crest of the opposite hill a file of

Indians, their painted bodies and feather crested heads standing out

against the glowing sky, as distinctly as a picture on a white leaf.

Back I flew to the church, with the alarm hot on my lips, and found that

Parson Craig had assembled all within for evening worship. In an

instant, Bible and Psalm book laid aside, the doors of the church were

barricaded, and we youths, each with rifle or musket loaded and primed,

stood close about our parson, awaiting orders.

"Lads," he said, in tones that rang as they did when he preached one of

his famous sermons of warning to sinners, and dropping in a Scotch word

here and there, as he was apt to when excited, "keep cool and fire

carefully when ye ha'e taken good aim. We ha'e nae bullets to spare and

each ain maun hold himself responsible for half a dozen savages.

Remember, lads, ye are fightin' for your maithers, your sisters, your

kirk an' your hames, for a' that true men hauld dear, and if ye maun gie

your verra lives to save these dearer things count not the price, but

pay like brave men, and like brothers o' that dear Christ wha gladly

gi'ed His life a sacrifice for us a'. Fear not death, my lads--'tis but

the beginning of life, but fear for your maithers' and your sisters'

torture and dishonor."

Hardly had the brave pastor spoken the last word, when the stockade was

surrounded by whooping red skins, brandishing tomahawks and war clubs,

and yelling to each other unintelligible words of command or

exhortation. In another instant they were flying a shower of arrows and

bullets over the top of the stockade, and several savage faces appeared

above the wall.

A second, third and fourth attempt to scale the stockade was made. For a

while, however, I could render little assistance in checking our enemies

from without, for I was engaged in a hand to hand death grapple with one

of the three Indians who at the first rush succeeded in getting within

our enclosure. Never, before or since, had I so mighty a wrestle for my

life, and but for my superior height, and the strength of my strong

arms, my reader would have been spared this personal narrative.

The next half hour--it seems thrice as long--stays in my mind as an idea

of what Hell might well be like. Row after row of hideous, paint

streaked, savage faces rose about our wall; the crack of rifles, the

whizz of arrows, the yell of the red demons, the shrieks of the wounded,

the groans of the dying, mingled in a hideous clamor, and above all rose

the wailing of frightened children, and the moans of terrified women.

The one harmonious note amidst this frightful discord was the ringing,

cheerful tone of Parson Craig's voice, as he encouraged his lads between

the quickly succeeding shots of his own musket.

Again and again I fired my good rifle, and whenever a savage face fell

backward from the top of the stockade, I experienced a heart bound of

fierce joy. Not until there was almost complete silence about us and not

a living Indian in sight, did we boys cease the almost mechanical action

of loading and firing, and turn to look about us.

The ground both within and without the enclosure, was strewn with dead

and dying Indians, half a score of them at least, and some of the lads

were carrying our own injured, six in all, into the church, where tender

hands waited to dress their wounds. Presently I discovered clotted blood

upon my sleeve, and realized for the first time that a bullet had

pierced my leathern shirt and the flesh of my left arm between shoulder

and elbow.

Next day the militiamen joined us, and we learned that the Indians had

evaded them by seeking another pass higher up the range; also that they

had devastated all the valley, except our end of it. We had stopped

effectually the war party detailed against us, and had saved our homes

and crops, as well as the lives of our women and children. The valley

rang with praise of "the fighting lads," and my father's face beamed

with pride and tenderness as he shook my hand.

"I shall call you boy no longer, Donald," he said; "you have nobly

earned your majority; my advice is always at your service, sir, but no

longer I give you commands." I think I never had a promotion or an honor

that so pleasured me; and doubtless my father was shrewd enough to know

that by thus expressing his pride and confidence in me, he was fixing

upon me a sense of uplifting responsibility, as one from whom only noble

deeds were expected, which would prove a restraint stronger than any

which the most respected authority could impose--an obligation to right

and duty neither to be shirked, nor forgotten.