THE atmosphere of mystery that surrounds the Kendrick Place in Putnam
County is illusive, of course; but the illusion is perfect. The old
house, standing a dozen yards from the roadside, is picturesque with
the contrivances of neglect and decay. Through a door hanging loose
upon its hinges the passer-by may behold the evidences of loneliness
and gloom,--the very embodiment of desolation,--a void, a silence, that
is almost portentous. The roof, with its crop of quaint gables, in
which proportion has been sacrificed to an effort to attain
architectural liveliness, is covered with a greenish-grey moss on the
north side, and has long been given over to decay on all sides. The
cat-squirrels that occasionally scamper across the crumbling shingles
have as much as they can do, with all their nimbleness, to find a
secure foot-hold. The huge wooden columns that support the double
veranda display jagged edges at top and bottom, and no longer make even
a pretence of hiding their grim hollowness. The well, hospitably placed
within arm's reach of the highway, for the benefit of the dead and
buried congregation that long ago met and worshipped at Bethesda
meeting-house, is stripped of windlass, chain, and bucket. All the
outhouses have disappeared, if they ever had an existence; and nothing
remains to tell the story of a flourishing era, save a fig-tree, which
is graciously green and fruitful in season. This fig-tree has grown to
an extraordinary height, and covers a large area with its canopy of
limbs and leaves, giving a sort of Oriental flavour to the illusion of
mystery and antiquity. It is said of this fig-tree that sermons have
been preached and marriages solemnised under its wide-spreading
branches; and there is a vague tradition to the effect that a duel was
once fought in its shadow by some of the hot-bloods. But no harm will
come of respectfully but firmly doubting this tradition; for it is a
fact, common to both memory and observation, that duels, even in the
old days, when each and every one of us was the pink of chivalry and
the soul of honour, were much rarer than the talk of them.
Nevertheless, the confession may be made that without such a tradition
a fig-tree surrounded by so many evidences of neglect and decay would
be a tame affair indeed.
The house, with its double veranda, its tall chimneys, and its curious
collection of gables, was built as late as 1836 by young Felix
Kendrick, in order, as Grandsir Kendrick declared, to show that "some
folks was as good as other folks." Whether Felix succeeded in this or
not, it is impossible to gather from either local history or tradition;
but there is no doubt that the house attracted attention, for its
architectural liveliness has never to this day been duplicated in that
region. In those days the Kendrick family was a new one, so to speak,
but ambitious. Grandsir Kendrick--a fatal title in itself--was a hatter
by trade, who had come to Georgia in search of a precarious livelihood.
He obtained permission to build him a little log hut by the side of a
running stream; and, for a year or two, people going along the road
could hear the snap and twang of his bowstring as he whipped wool or
rabbit fur into shape. Some said he was from North Carolina; others
said he was from Connecticut; but whether from one State or the other,
what should a hatter do away off in the woods in Putnam County?
Grandsir Kendrick, who was shrewd, close-fisted, and industrious, did
what any sensible man would have done: he became an overseer. In this
business, which required no capital, he developed considerable
executive ability. The plantations he had charge of paid large profits
to their owners, and he found his good management in demand. He
commanded a large salary, and saved money. This money he invested in
negroes, buying one at a time and hiring them out. He finally came to
be the owner of seven or eight stout field hands; whereupon he bought
two hundred acres of choice land, and set himself up as a patriarch.
Grandsir Kendrick kept to his sober ways, continued his good
management, and, in the midst of much shabbiness, continued to put
aside money in the shape of negroes. He also reared a son, who
contrived somehow to have higher notions than his father. These notions
of young Felix Kendrick were confirmed and enlarged by his marriage to
the daughter of a Methodist circuit-rider. This young lady had been
pinched by poverty often enough to know the value of economy, while the
position of her father had given her advantages which the most
fortunate young ladies of that day might have envied. In short, Mrs.
Felix turned out to be a very superior woman in all respects. She was
proud as well as pretty, and managed to hold her own with the element
which Grandsir Kendrick sometimes dubiously referred to as "the
quality." The fact that Mrs. Felix's mother was a Barksdale probably
had something to do with her energy and tact; but whatever the cause of
her popularity may have been, Grandsir Kendrick was very proud of his
son's wife. He had no sympathy with, and no part in, her high notions;
but their manifestation afforded him the spectacle of an experience
entirely foreign to his own. Here was his son's wife stepping high, and
compelling his son to step high. So far as Grandsir Kendrick was
concerned, however, it was merely a spectacle. To the day of his death,
he never ceased to higgle over a thrip, and it was his constant boast
that in his own experience it had always been convenient to give
prudence the upper hand of pride.
In 1850 the house was not showing many signs of decay, but young Mrs.
Felix had become the widow Kendrick, her daughter Kitty bad grown to be
a beautiful young woman, and her son Felix was a lad of remarkable
promise. The loss of her husband was a great blow to Mrs. Kendrick.
With all her business qualities, her affection for her family and her
home was strongly marked, and her husband stood first as the head and
centre of each. Felix Kendrick died in the latter part of November
1849, and his widow made him a grave under the shadow of a tree he had
planted when a boy, and in full view of her window. The obsequies were
very simple. A prayer was said, and a song was sung; that was all. But
it was understood that the funeral sermon would be preached at the
house by Mrs. Kendrick's brother, who was on his way home from China,
where he had been engaged in converting (to use a neighbourhood phrase)
the "squinch-eyed heathen."
The weeks went by, and the missionary brother returned; and one Sunday
morning in February it was given out at Bethesda that "on the first
Sabbath after the second Tuesday in March, the funeral sermon of
Brother Felix Kendrick will be preached at the house by Brother
Garwood." On the morning of this particular Sunday, which was selected
because it did not conflict with the services of the Bethesda
congregation, two neighbours met in the forks of the public road that
leads to Rockville. Each had come from a different direction. One was
riding and one was walking; and both were past the middle time of life.
"Well met, Brother Roach!" exclaimed the man on horseback.
"You've took the words from my mouth, Brother Brannum. I hope you are
well. I'm peart myself, but not as peart as I thought I was, bekaze I
find that the two or three miles to come is sticking in my craw."
"Ah, when it comes to that, Brother Roach," said the man on horseback,
"you and me can be one another's looking-glass. Look on me, and you'll
see what time has done for you."
"Not so, Brother Brannum! Not so!" exclaimed the other. "There's some
furrows on your forrud, and a handful of bird-tracks below your eyes
that would ill become me; and I'm plumper in the make-up, you'll
allow."
"Yes, yes, Brother Johnny Roach," said Brother Brannum, frowning a
little; "but what of that? Death takes no time to feel for wrinkles and
furrows, and nuther does plumpness stand in the way. Look at Brother
Felix Kendrick,--took off in the very pulse and power of his prime, you
may say. Yet, Providence permitting, I am to hark to his funeral
to-day."
"Why, so am I,--so am I," exclaimed Brother Roach. "We seem to agree,
Brother Brannum, like the jay-bird and the joree,--one in the tree and
t'other on the ground."
Brother Brannum's grim sense of superiority showed itself in his calm
smile.
"Yet I'll not deny," continued Brother Roach, flinging his coat, which
he had been carrying on his arm, across his shoulder, "that sech
discourses go ag'in the grain It frets me in the mind for to hear what
thundering great men folks git to be arter they are dead, though I hope
we may both follow suit, Brother Brannum."
"But how, Brother Johnny Roach?"
"Why, by the grace of big discourses, Brother Brannum. There 'a many a
preacher could close down the Bible on his hankcher and make our very
misdeeds smell sweet as innocence. It's all in the lift of the eyebrow,
and the gesticures of the hand. So old Neighbour Harper says, and he's
been a lawyer and a schoolmaster in his day and time.".
"Still," said Brother Brannum, as if acknowledging the arguments, "I
think Sister Kendrick is jestified in her desires."
"Oh, yes,--oh, yes!" replied Brother Roach, heartily; "none more so.
Felix Kendrick's ways is in good shape for some preacher wi' a glib
tongue. Felix was a good man; he wanted his just dues, but not if to
take them would hurt a man. He was neighbourly; who more so? And, sir,
when you got to rastlin' wi' trouble, he'd find you and fetch you out.
I only hope the Chinee preacher'll be jedgmatical enough for to let us
off wi' the simple truth."
"They say," said Brother Brannum, "that he's a man full of grace and
fire."
"Well, sir," said Johnny Roach, "if he but makes me disremember that I
left the bay mar' at home, I'll thank him kindly."
"Mercy, Brother Roach," exclaimed Brother Brannum, taking this as a
neighbourly hint, "mount up here and rest yourself, whilst I stretch my
legs along this level piece of ground."
"I'd thank you kindly, Brother Branuum, if you wouldn't so misjudge me!
It's my will to walk; but if I git my limbs sot to the saddle here and
now, they'd ache and crack might'ly when next I called upon 'em. I'll
take the will for the deed, Brother Brannum."
Thus these neighbours jogged along to Felix Kendrick's funeral. They
found a great crowd ahead of them when they got there, though they were
not too late for the services; but the house was filled with
sympathetic men and women, and those who came late were compelled to
find such accommodations as the yard afforded; and these accommodations
were excellent in their way, for there was the cool green grass under
the trees, and there were the rustic seats in the shadow of the
fig-tree of which mention has been made.
Coming together, Brother Brannum and Brother Roach stayed together; and
they soon found themselves comfortably seated under the fig-tree,--a
point of view from which they could observe everything that was going
on. Brother Brannum, who was a pillar of Bethesda church, and extremely
officious withal, seemed to regret that he had not arrived soon enough
to find a place in the house near the preacher, but Brother Roach
appeared to congratulate himself that he had been crowded out of
ear-shot.
"We can set here," he declared in great good-humour, "and hear the
singing, and then whirl in and preach each man his own sermon. I know
better than the furrin preacher what'd be satisfactual to Felix
Kendrick. I see George Denham sailing in and out and flying around; and
if the pinch comes, as come it must, Brother Brannum, we can up and ast
George for to fetch us sech reports as a hongry man can stomach."
Brother Brannum frowned heavily, but made no response. Presently
Brother Roach beckoned to the young man whom he had called George
Denham. "Howdy, George! How is Kitty Kendrick? Solemn as the season is,
George, I lay 'twould be wrong for to let Beauty pine."
The young man suppressed a smile, and raised his hands in protest.
"Uncle Johnny! to joke me at such a time! I shall go to-morrow and cut
your mill-race, and you will never know who did it."
"Ah, George! if death changes a man no more'n they say it does, little
does Felix Kendrick need to be holp by these dismal takings-on. From
first to last, he begrudged no man his banter. But here we are, and
yan's the preacher. The p'int wi' me, George, is, how kin we-all
setting on the back seats know when the preacher gits to his 'amen,'
onless his expoundance is too loud to be becoming?"
"Come, now, Uncle Johnny," said young Denham, "no winking, and I'll
tell you. I was talking to Miss Kitty just now, and all of a sudden she
cried out, 'Why, yonder's Uncle Johnny Roach, and he's walking, too.
Uncle Johnny must stay to dinner;' and Mrs. Kendrick says, 'Yes, and
Brother Branmim too.' And so there you are."
"Well, sir," exclaimed Brother Roach, "Kitty always had a piece of my
heart, and now she has it all."
"A likely young man, that George Denham," said Brother Brannum, as
Denham moved towards the house.
"You never spoke a truer word, Brother Brannum," said Brother Roach,
enthusiastically. "Look at his limbs, look at his gait, look at his
eye. If the world, the flesh, and the devil don't freeze out his
intents, you'll hear from that chap. He's a-gitting high up in the law,
and where'll you find a better managed plantation than his'n?"
What else Brother Roach said or might have said must be left to
conjecture. In the midst of his eulogy on the living, the preacher in
the house began his eulogy of the dead. Those who heard what he said
were much edified, and those who failed to hear made a decorous
pretence of listening intently. In the midst of the sermon Brother
Roach felt himself touched on the arm. Looking up, he saw that Brother
Brannum was gazing intently at one of the gables on the roof. Following
the direction of Brother Brannum's eyes, Brother Roach beheld, with
astonishment not unmixed with awe, the head and shoulders of a
powerfully built negro. The attitude of the negro was one of attention.
He was evidently trying to hear the sermon. His head was bent, and the
expression of his face was indicative of great good-humour. His shirt
was ragged and dirty, and had fallen completely away from one arm and
shoulder, and the billowy muscles glistened in the sun. While Brother
Brannum and Brother Roach were gazing at him with some degree of
amazement, an acorn dropped upon the roof from one of the tall oaks.
Startled by the sudden noise, the negro glanced hurriedly around, and
dropped quickly below the line of vision.
"Well, well, well!" exclaimed Brother Roach, after exchanging a look of
amazement with Brother Brannum. "Well, well, well! Who'd 'a' thought
it? Once 'twas the nigger in the wood-pile; now it's the nigger in the
steeple, and arter a while they'll be a-flying in the air,--mark my
words. I call that the impidence of the Old Boy. Maybe you don't know
that nigger, Brother Brannum?"
"I disremember if I do, Brother Roach."
"Well, sir, when one of 'em passes in front of your Uncle Johnny, you
may up and sw'ar his dagarrytype is took. That nigger, roosting up
there so slick and cool, is Bledser's Blue Dave. Nuther more, nuther
less."
"Bledser's Blue Dave!" exclaimed Brother Brannum in a voice made
sepulchral by amazement.
"The identical nigger! I'd know him if I met him arm-in-arm with the
King and Queen of France."
"Why, I thought Blue Dave had made his disappearance five year ago,"
said Brother Brannum.
"Well, sir, my two eyes tells me different. Time and time ag'in I've
been told he's a quare creetur. Some say he's strong as a horse and
venomous as a snake. Some say he's swifter than the wind and slicker
than a red fox. And many's the time by my own h'a'th-stone I've had to
pooh-pooh these relations; yet there's no denying that for mighty nigh
seven year that nigger's been trolloping round through the woods
foot-loose and scotch-free, bidding defiance to the law of the State
and Bill Brand's track dogs."
"Well, sir," said Brother Brannum, fetching his hand down on his knee
with a thwack, "we ought to alarm the assemblage."
"Jes so," replied Brother Roach, with something like a chuckle; "but
you forgit the time and the occasion, Brother Brannum. I'm a worldly
man myself, as you may say, but 'twill be long arter I'm more
worldlier than what I am before you can ketch me cuttin' sech a scollop
as to wind up a funeral sermon wi' a race arter a runaway nigger."
Brother Brannum agreed with this view, but it was with a poor grace. He
had a vague remembrance of certain rewards that had from time to time
been offered for the capture of Blue Dave, and he was anxious to have a
hand in securing at least a part of these. But he refrained from
sounding the alarm. With Brother Roach, he remained at the Kendrick
Place after the sermon was over, and took dinner. He rode off shortly
afterwards, and the next day Bill Brand and his track dogs put in an
appearance; but Blue Dave was gone.
It was a common thing to hear of fugitive negroes; but Blue Dave (so
called because of the inky blackness of his skin) had a name and a fame
that made him the terror of the women and children, both white and
black; and Kitty Kendrick and her mother were not a little disturbed
when they learned that he had been in hiding among the gables of their
house. The negro's success in eluding pursuit caused the
ignorant-minded of both races to attribute to him the possession of some
mysterious power. He grew into a legend; he became a part of the
folk-lore of the section. According to popular belief, he possessed strange
powers and great courage; he became a giant, a spirit of evil. Women
frightened their children into silence by calling his name, and many a
youngster crept to bed in mortal fear that Blue Dave would come in the
night and whisk him away into the depths of the dark woods. Whatever
mischief was done was credited to Blue Dave. If a horse was found in
the lot spattered with mud, Blue Dave had ridden it; if a cow was
crippled, a hog missing, or a smoke-house robbed, Blue Dave was sure to
be at the bottom of it all, so far as popular belief was concerned. The
negroes had many stories to tell of him. One had seen him standing by a
tall poplar-tree. He was about to speak to him when there came a flash
of lightning and a crash of thunder, and Blue Dave disappeared, leaving
a sulphurous smell behind him. He had been seen by another negro. He
was standing in the middle of the Armour's Ferry road. He was armed
with a gleaming reaphook, and accompanied by a big black dog. As soon
as the dog saw the new-comer, it bristled up from head to foot, its
eyes shone like two coals of fire, and every hair on its back emitted a
fiery spark.
Very little was known of the history of Blue Dave. He was brought to
the little village of Rockville in chains in a speculator's train,--the
train consisting of two Conestoga wagons and thirty or forty
forlorn-looking negroes. The speculator explained that he had manacled Blue
Dave because he was unmanageable; and he put him on the block to sell
him after making it perfectly clear to everybody that whoever bought
the negro would get a bad bargain. Nevertheless Blue Dave was a
magnificent specimen of manhood, straight as an arrow, as muscular as
Hercules, and with a countenance as open and as pleasant as one would
wish to see. He was bought by General Alfred Bledser, and put on his
River Place. He worked well for a few weeks, but got into trouble with
the overseer, and finally compromised matters by taking to the woods.
He seemed born for this particular business; for the track dogs failed
to find him, and all the arts and artifices employed for capturing and
reclaiming runaways failed in his case. It was a desperate sort of
freedom he enjoyed; but he seemed suited to it, and he made the most of
it.
As might be supposed, there was great commotion in the settlement, and
particularly at the Kendrick homestead, when it was known that Blue
Dave had been hiding among the gables of the Kendrick house. Mrs.
Kendrick and her daughter Kitty possessed their full share of what
Brother Roach would have called "spunk;" but there is a large and very
important corner of the human mind--particularly if it happens to be a
feminine mind--which devotes itself to superstition; and these gentle
ladies, while they stood in no terror of Blue Dave as a runaway negro
simply, were certainly awed by the spectral figure which had grown up
out of common report. The house negroes stood in mortal dread of Blue
Dave, and their dismay was not without its effect upon Mrs. Kendrick
and her daughter. Jenny, the house-girl, refused to sleep at the
quarters; and when Aunt Tabby, the cook, started for her cabin after
dark, she was accompanied by a number of little negroes bearing
lightwood torches. All the stories and legends that clustered around
Blue Dave's career were brought to the surface again; and, as we have
seen, the great majority of them were anything but reassuring.