so as to rake the Indians by a flank fire, and was pouring a galling
fire into the head of the assaulting column. Yet, nothing dismayed, the
daring foe crowded against the gates, their blows falling faster and
heavier, while now and then they attempted to scale the pickets. At
length, unable to do this or to force open the well-barred and ponderous
gate, the bold warriors advanced to the block-houses, and standing
before them, pointed their guns in at the port holes; both sides
sometimes at the same instant firing through the same opening. It was
the policy of Major Buchanan to impress upon them the idea that the fort
contained a large garrison. To do this it was necessary for his men to
fire their guns often, and occasionally in volleys. At this crisis the
whisper went round--"All is lost. Our bullets are out!" But there were
guardian angels whom these brave men knew not of. Scarcely had the words
been spoken, when Mrs. Buchanan passed around with an apronful of
bullets, which she and Nancy Mulherrin, the Major's sister, had moulded,
during the fight, out of her plates and spoons. At the same time she
gave to each of the tired soldiers some brandy which she carried in a
pewter basin. During the contest they had thus moulded three hundred
bullets. Not without their fun were these hardy men in this hour of
peril. In order to keep up a show of good spirits, they frequently cried
out to the Indians, "Shoot bullets, you squaws! Why don't you put powder
in your guns?" This was understood, for Watts and many others spoke very
good English, and they replied by daring them to come out and fight like
men. In the midst of these banterings, Mrs. Buchanan discovered a large
blunderbuss which had been standing in a corner during the fight and had
not been discharged, and gave it to an Irishman named O'Connor to fire
off. In telling the story afterwards the Irish man said: An' she gave me
the wide-mouthed fusee and bade me to shoot that at the blasted
creeters, and Jimmy O'Connor he took the fusee, and he pulled the
trigger when the rest fired, for three or four times, and loaded her
again every time, and so ye see, yer honor, when I pulled the trigger
again, the fusee went off, it did, and Jimmy O'Connor went under the
bed. This unequal contest lasted for four long hours, and when the first
blush of morning began to appear in the east, most of the chiefs were
killed or wounded. The boastful Shawnee was transfixed in death, leaning
against the gate which he had so valorously assaulted; the White Owl's
son and Unacate, or the White-man-killer, were mortally wounded, and
John Watts was borne off on a litter, shot through both legs.
During this protracted fight Mrs. Buchanan aided the defenders by words
and deeds, as if life or death depended upon the efforts which she was
then making. She knew, and all knew, that if the assault could be
repelled for four hours, relief would come from the neighboring posts.
Foiled, discouraged, their leaders disabled, this formidable army of
savage warriors precipitately retreated towards their country, bearing
off most of their wounded, yet leaving many dead upon the field. This
was the first formidable invasion of Cumberland valley, and its tide was
rolled back as much by the presence of mind and heroic firmness of Sarah
Buchanan and Nancy Mulherrin, as by the rifles of their husbands and
friends. The fame of this gallant defence went abroad, and the young
wife of Major Buchanan was celebrated as the greatest heroine of the
West. From 1780 to 1796, there was not a year in which her family had
not been exposed to peril, in which, of course, she was a partaker.[63]
[63] This heroic woman died at Buchanan's Station, on the twenty-third
of November, 1831. She sleeps on the site of the old fort that witnessed
her bravery; and Carcas, queen of Carcassone, who defended that city
with such courage and resolution, when it was besieged by Charlemagne,
that the Emperor permitted her to retain the sovereignty of the place,
has scarcely higher claims to historical commemoration.
AUTHOR.
MAGNANIMITY OF MRS. M'KAY.
Greatness of mind, and nobleness, their seat
In her build loveliest.
MILTON.
"In the beginning of June, 1781, the British garrison at Augusta,
Georgia, capitulated to the American forces, under command of General
Pickens and Colonel Lee, of the partizan legion. Colonel Grierson, who
was obnoxious to the Americans on account of his barbarities, was shot
down by an unknown hand, after he was a prisoner. A reward of one
hundred guineas was offered to any person who would point out the
offender, but in vain. Colonel Brown, the British commander, expecting
the same fate, conscious that he deserved it, from his unrelenting and
vindictive disposition towards the Americans, was furnished with a
guard, although he had hanged thirteen American prisoners, and had given
others into the hands of the Indians to be tortured. On his way to
Savannah, he passed through the settlements where he had burned a number
of houses, and hung some of the relatives of the inhabitants. At
Silverbluff, Mrs. M'Kay obtained leave of the American officer, who
commanded his safeguard, to speak to him; when she thus addressed
him:--'Colonel Brown, in the late day of your prosperity, I visited your
camp, and on my knees supplicated for the life of my only son, but you
were deaf to my entreaties; you hanged him, though a beardless youth,
before my face. These eyes have seen him scalped by the savages under
your immediate command, and for no better reason than that his name was
M'Kay. As you are now a prisoner to the leaders of my country, for the
present I lay aside all thoughts of revenge, but when you resume your
sword, I will go five hundred miles to demand satisfaction at the point
of it, for the murder of my son!'"
[Illustration: THE GENEROUS DENTIST.]
HEROIC CONDUCT OF A DAUGHTER.
Fair was her face, and spotless was her mind,
Where filial love with virgin sweetness joined.
POPE.
Xantippe, a Roman lady, who nursed her father, the aged Cimonus, while
he was a prisoner, and thereby saved his life, rendered herself immortal
by this manifestation of filial affection. But the "Roman Charity" is
not comparable to the following extraordinary deed of filial sacrifice.
The winter of 1783 was unusually severe, and the sufferings of the poor
in the city of New York were very great. One family, consisting of the
husband, wife and one daughter, were, on one occasion, reduced to the
last stick of wood, and were wholly destitute of provisions. The
daughter, who had thus far supported her aged and infirm parents by her
industry, was out of work, and knew not what to do. At this juncture of
affairs, she recollected that a dentist had advertised for sound
fore-teeth, and offered three guineas a piece for all he was himself
permitted to extract. In the midst of her grief, the generous girl
suddenly brightened up, and hastened to the dentist's office. She
made known the condition of her parents, and offered to dispose of all
her fore-teeth on his terms. The dentist, instead of extracting a tooth,
with tears in his eyes, placed in her hands ten guineas, and sent her,
rejoicing, to the relief of her parents.
HEROIC DECISION.
No thought of flight,
None of retreat, no unbecoming deed
That argued fear.
MILTON.
We have elsewhere in this work spoken of the perils necessary to be
encountered by Christian missionaries, and particularly those who
connect themselves with stations in Africa. The history of the Methodist
Episcopal mission in that quarter of the globe, presents a noble, if not
a long, list of soldiers who early fell there while contending with
Error. They sank upon the battle field, with their armor on and covered
with glory. They fell not before the hosts of paganism; they were
conquered by the climate. Most of those who have not died on the field,
have been obliged to shortly flee to their native land for the
restoration of health. Here and there one has withstood the adverse
nature of the climate, toiled for years, and done a noble work, which
has caused rejoicing in Heaven and honored the name of Christ on earth.
Few persons, whose names are connected with the history of modern
missions, have displayed a more devoted, self-sacrificing spirit, or
greater moral courage, than Miss Sophronia Farrington. Prior to the
autumn of 1834, of six missionaries who had entered the field in Africa
under the patronage of American Methodists, three[64] were in their
graves, and two[65] had returned to the United States for health. Miss
Farrington stood alone, and the question arose, what she should do. The
officers of the Missionary Society were willing she should return home,
and her friends were urging it upon her. With her co-laborers all dead
or fled, she seemed herself to be left to the alternative either to flee
or fall. Should she choose the former course, the mission would be
wholly, and, for ought she knew, for ever, abandoned. What then should
she do? Like a hero, to use her own words, she had "offered her soul
upon the altar of her God, for the salvation of that long benighted
continent," and with courage that shames the facer of the cannon's
mouth, she resolved to remain and toil alone, beside the graves of her
fallen companions till more help should come or the Divine Husbandman
close the labors of the lone vine-dresser. More help arrived in a few
months, and, according to the annual report of 1836, the mission, of
whose history she formed at one time the connecting link, "continued to
loom up in bright perspective, and promise a rich reward for all the
labors and sufferings of the faithful missionaries."
[64] Rev. M. B. Cox and Rev. O. S. Wright and wife.
[65] Rev. Mr. Spaulding and lady.
THE DAUGHTER OF AARON BURR.
'Tis thine on every heart to 'grave thy praise,
A monument which Worth alone can raise.
BROOME.
Theodosia, the only daughter of Aaron Burr, was a woman of superior
mental accomplishments, and very strong affections. She was married to
Joseph Alston, Esq., afterwards Governor of South Carolina, in 1801. She
was then in her eighteenth year. That she was an excellent wife may be
gathered, not merely from the story of her life, but from the testimony
of her husband. Writing to her father in 1813--soon after her death--he
says, "The man who has been deemed worthy of the heart of Theodosia
Burr, and has felt what it was to be blest with such a woman's, will
never forget his elevation."[66]
[66] Memoirs of Aaron Burr, by Matthew L. Davis, vol. 2, p. 432.
In regard to her attachment to her father, a writer, quoted in the
appendix to Safford's Life of Blennerhassett, remarks as follows: "Her
love for her father partook of the purity of a better world; holy, deep,
unchanging; it reminds us of the affection which a celestial spirit
might be supposed to entertain for a parent cast down from heaven, for
sharing in the sin of the 'Son of the Morning.' No sooner did she hear
of the arrest of her father, than she fled to his side.[67] There is
nothing in human history more touching than the hurried letters, blotted
with tears, in which she announced her daily progress to Richmond; for
she was too weak to travel with the rapidity of the mail."
[67] He was imprisoned in Richmond, Virginia.--AUTHOR.
Had her health permitted, and occasion presented itself, she would have
matched in heroism any act in the life of Margaret Roper or Elizabeth
Cazotte.[68]
[68] Mrs. Roper accompanied her father, Sir Thomas More, to prison, and
after he was executed and his head had lain fourteen days on London
Bridge, she purchased it, and thus saved it from being thrown into the
Thames. For this intrepidity, by the king's orders she was cast into
prison--though she was soon permitted to escape.
Mademoiselle Cazotte was the daughter of an aged Frenchman, who, on one
occasion, during the Revolution in his country, would have lost his life
but for her courage. He was a "counter-revolutionist," and after an
imprisonment, during which his daughter chose to be immured with him, on
the second day of September, he was about to be slain. An axe was raised
over his head, when Elizabeth threw herself upon him, and exclaimed,
"Strike, barbarians; you cannot reach my father but through my heart."
She did other heroic deeds.
The trial of her father for treason, and his virtual banishment, not
only depressed her spirits, but fearfully racked her already feeble
constitution, yet his disgrace abated not a tittle the ardor of her
affection; and when he returned from Europe, though in feeble health,
she resolved to visit him in the city of New York. She was then in South
Carolina. Embarking in the privateer Patriot, on the thirteenth of
January, 1813, she was never heard of afterwards. The schooner may have
fallen into the hands of pirates; but, as a heavy gale was experienced
for several days soon after leaving Georgetown, the probability is that
the craft foundered. Thus closed a life to which the panegyrical
exclamation of Milton happily applies:
O glorious trial of exceeding love
Illustrious evidence, example high.
FEMALE INTREPIDITY.
Be not dismayed--fear nurses up a danger,
And resolution kills it in the birth.
PHILLIPS.
During the war between the Indians and Kentuckians, while the owner of a
plantation in a thinly settled part of the state, was at work with his
slaves in the field, a sable sentinel, who was posted near the house,
saw a party of savages approaching. One of them was more fleet than he,
and reaching the house at the same moment, they rushed within doors
together. The planter's wife instantly closed the door and the negro and
Indian grappled. The former was the stronger of the two, though the
latter was the more expert. After a hard struggle, the negro threw the
Indian, and held him fast until the woman beheaded him with a broad-axe.
The negro then seized the guns, and began to fire at the other Indians
through the loop-holes. The guns were loaded by the woman as fast as
discharged. Their frequent report soon brought the laborers from the
field, and the surviving Indians were driven away.
THE WIFE OF RICHARD SHUBRICK.
Be fire with fire;
Threaten the threatener, and out face the brow
Of bragging horror: so shall inferior eyes,
That borrow their behavior from the great,
Grow great by your example.
SHAKSPEARE.
The following anecdotes of Mrs. Richard Shubrick may be found in the
First Series of Major Garden's Revolutionary Anecdotes. "There was," he
writes, "an appearance of personal debility about her that rendered her
peculiarly interesting: it seemed to solicit the interest of every
heart, and the man would have felt himself degraded who would not have
put his life at hazard to serve her. Yet, when firmness of character was
requisite, when fortitude was called for to repel the encroachments of
aggression, there was not a more intrepid being in existence.
"An American soldier, flying from a party of the enemy, sought her
protection, and was promised it. The British, pressing close upon him,
insisted that he should be delivered up, threatening immediate and
universal destruction in case of refusal. The ladies, her friends and
companions, who were in the house with her, shrunk from the contest,
and were silent; but, undaunted by their threats, this intrepid lady
placed herself before the chamber into which the unfortunate fugitive
had been conducted, and resolutely said, 'To men of honor the chamber of
a lady should be as sacred as the sanctuary! I will defend the passage
to it though I perish. You may succeed, and enter it, but it shall be
over my corpse.' 'By God,' said the officer, 'if muskets were only
placed in the hands of a few such women, our only safety would be found
in retreat. Your intrepidity, madam, gives you security; from me you
shall meet no further annoyance.'
"At Brabant, the seat of the respectable and patriotic Bishop Smith, a
sergeant of Tarleton's dragoons, eager for the acquisition of plunder,
followed the overseer, a man advanced in years, into the apartment where
the ladies of the family were assembled, and on his refusing to discover
the spot in which the plate was concealed, struck him with violence,
inflicting a severe sabre wound across the shoulders. Aroused by the
infamy of the act, Mrs. Shubrick, starting from her seat, and placing
herself betwixt the ruffian and his victim, resolutely said, 'Place
yourself behind me, Murdoch; the interposition of my body shall give you
protection, or I will die:' then, addressing herself to the sergeant,
exclaimed, 'O what a degradation of manhood--what departure from that
gallantry which was once the characteristic of British soldiers. Human
nature is degraded by your barbarity;--but should you persist, then
strike at _me_, for till I die, no further injury shall be done to
_him_.' The sergeant, unable to resist such commanding eloquence,
retired."[69]
[69] "The hope, however, of attaining the object in view, very speedily
subjected the unfortunate Murdoch to new persecution. He was tied up
under the very tree where the plate was buried, and threatened with
immediate execution unless he would make the discovery required. But
although well acquainted with the unrelenting severity of his enemy, and
earnestly solicited by his wife, to save his life by a speedy confession
of the place of deposit, he persisted resolutely, that a sacred trust
was not to be betrayed, and actually succeeded in preserving it."
KEEN RETORT OF MRS. ASHE.
I have a thousand spirits in one breast,
To answer twenty thousand such as you.
SHAKSPEARE.
While General Leslie was staying with the British troops at Halifax,
North Carolina, Colonel Tarleton and other officers held their quarters
at the house of Colonel Ashe, whose wife was a firm friend of liberty.
Her beau ideal of the hero was Colonel William Washington; and, knowing
this fact, the sarcastic Tarleton took great delight in speaking
diminutively of this officer in her presence. In his jesting way, he
remarked to her one time, that he should like to have an opportunity of
seeing her friend, Colonel Washington, whom he had understood to be a
very small man. Mrs. Ashe promptly replied, "If you had looked behind
you, Colonel Tarleton, at the battle of the Cowpens, you would have had
that pleasure."[70]
[70] It is said that this taunt was so keenly felt that Tarleton laid
his hand on the hilt of his sword. General Leslie entered the room at
the moment, and seeing the agitation of Mrs. Ashe, and learning its
cause, said to her, "Say what you please, Mrs. Ashe; Colonel Tarleton
knows better than to insult a lady in my presence."
PHILANTHROPIC WIFE OF A DRUNKARD.
There's in you all that we believe of heaven.
OTWAY.
"The amazing influence of one Christian, who shows in her life the
spirit of Christ, is illustrated in a striking manner, in the life of a
lady who died not long since, in one of the principal cities of the
United States. I am not permitted to give her name, nor all the
particulars of her life. But what I relate may be relied upon, not only
as facts, but as far below the whole truth. She had been for a long time
afflicted with a drunken husband. At length the sheriff came, and swept
off all her property, not excepting her household furniture, to
discharge his grog bills. At this distressing crisis, she retired to an
upper room, laid her babe upon the bare floor, kneeled down over it, and
offered up the following petition: "O Lord, if thou wilt _in any way_
remove from me this affliction, I will serve thee _upon bread and
water_, all the days of my life." The Lord took her at her word. Her
besotted husband immediately disappeared, and was never heard of again
till after her death. The church would now have maintained her, but she
would not consent to become a charge to others. Although in feeble
health, and afflicted with the sick headache, she opened a small school,
from which she obtained a bare subsistence; though it was often no more
than what was contained in the condition of her prayer--literally bread
and water. She was a lady of pleasing address, and of a mild and gentle
disposition. "In her lips was the law of kindness." Yet she possessed an
energy of character and a spirit of perseverance, which the power of
faith alone can impart. When she undertook any Christian enterprise, she
was discouraged by no obstacles, and appalled by no difficulties. She
resided in the most wicked and abandoned part of the city, which
afforded a great field of labor. Her benevolent heart was pained at
seeing the grog shops open upon the holy Sabbath. She undertook the
difficult and almost hopeless task of closing these sinks of moral
pollution upon the Lord's day, and succeeded. This was accomplished by
the mild influence of persuasion, flowing from the lips of kindness, and
clothed with that power which always accompanies the true spirit of the
gospel. But she was not satisfied with seeing the front doors and
windows of these houses closed. She would, therefore, upon the morning
of the Sabbath, pass round, and enter these shops through the dwellings
occupied by the families of the keepers, where she often found them
engaged secretly in this wickedness. She would then remonstrate with
them, until she persuaded them to abandon it, and attend public worship.
In this manner, she abolished, almost entirety, the sale of liquors
upon the Sabbath, in the worst part of the city.
"She also looked after the poor, that the Gospel might be preached to
them. She carried with her the number of those pews in the church which
were unoccupied. And upon Sabbath mornings, she made it her business to
go out in the streets and lanes of the city, and persuade the poor to
come in and fill up these vacant seats. By her perseverance and energy,
she would remove every objection, until she had brought them to the
house of God. She was incessant and untiring in every effort for doing
good. She would establish a Sabbath school, and superintend it until she
saw it flourishing, and then deliver it into the hands of some suitable
person, and go and establish another. She collected together a Bible
class of apprentices, which she taught herself. Her pastor one day
visited it, and found half of them in tears, under deep conviction. She
was faithful to the church and to impenitent sinners. It was her
habitual practice to reprove sin, and to warn sinners wherever she found
them. At the time of her death, she had under her care a number of pious
young men preparing for the ministry. These she had looked after, and
brought out of obscurity. As soon as their piety had been sufficiently
proved, she would bring them to the notice of her Christian friends. She
persuaded pious teachers to give them gratuitous instruction, and pious
booksellers to supply them with books. In the same way, she procured
their board in the families of wealthy Christians; and she formed
little societies of ladies, to supply them with clothing. There was
probably no person in the city whose death would have occasioned the
shedding of more tears, or called forth more sincere and heartfelt
grief."[71]
[71] Practical Directory for Young Christian Females.
THE MOTHER OF DR. DWIGHT.
Though renown
Plant laurels on the warrior's grave, and wreathe
With bays the slumbering bard--the mother's urn
Shall claim more dear memorials: gratitude
Shall there abide; affection, reverence, there
Shall oft revolve the precepts which now speak
With emphasis divine.
MRS. WEST.