Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1846-01-29
Select Tales.
The Mechanic Hero
or ~BRANDYWINE.
A TALE OF THE REVOLUTION.
By GEORGE LlpPARD, ESQ.

Near Dilworth Corner, at the time of the
Revolution, there stood a quiet cottage, some
what retired from the road, under the shade OF
a stout chestnut tree. 1t was a quiet cottage,
nesting away there in one corner of the forest
road, a dear home in the wilderness, with sloop-
ing roof, walls of dark grey stone, and a case
ment hidden among vines and flowers.
On one side amid an interval of the forest
trees, was seen the rough outline of a black
smiths shop. There was small garden IN
front, with a brown g~ravelled walk, and beds of
Wild flowers.
Here, at the time of the Revolution, there
dwell q stout blacksmith, with his young wife
and her babe. What CARED that blacksmith,
working away there in that shadowy nook of the
forest, for war! What feared he for the peril
of the times, so long as his stout arm, ringing
that hammer on the anvil, might gain bread for
his wife and child!
All! he cared little for war-he took little
note of the panic that shook the valley, when
some few mornings before the battle of Brandy
wine, while %slloeing the horse of a Tory rein-
gee, he overheard a plot for the surprise and
capture of Washington. The American leader
was to be lured into the tolls of the Tories
his person once in the British camp, the English
General might send the "Traltor Washington"
home to be tried in London.
Now our blacksmith, working away there in
that dim nook of the forest, without earring for
battle or war, had still a s%neaking kindness for
this Mister Washington, whose a IN rung on
the lips of all men. So one night, bidding his
young wife a hasty goodbye, and kissing the
babe that reposed on her bosom, smiling as it
slept, he hurried away to the American camp,
and told his story to Washington.
1t was morning ere he came back. 1t was in
the dimness of the autumnal morning that the
blacksmith was plodding his way along the for
est road. Some few PAGES ahead there was an
aged oak, standing out into the road-a grim old
veteran Of the forest, that had stood the shocks
6fthree hundred years, Right beyond that oak
was the blacksmith's home.
With this thought warming his heart, he hur-
RED on. He hurried on, thinking of the calm
young face and mild blue eyes Of that wife, who
the night before, had stood in the cottage door,
waving him out of sight with a beckoned good
bye-thinking of the baby, that lay smiling as
it slept upon her bosom, he hurried on-he
turned to the bend of the wood, he looked upon
his home.
All what a sight was there!
Where, the night before, he left a peaceful
cottage, smiling under a green chestnut tree in
the light of the setting sun, now was only a heap
of black and smoking embers aud a burnt and
blasted tree.
This was his home!
And there stood the blacksmith gazing upon
that wreck of his hearthstone there he stood
with folded arms and moody brow, but in a mo-
ment a smile broke over his face.
He saw it all. In the night his house had
taken fire, and burnt to cinders. But his wife,
and his child had escaped. For that he thanked
God.
With the toll Of his stout arm, playing there
on the anvil, he would build a fairer home for
wife and child fresh flowers should bloom over
the garden walks, and more lovely vines trail a.
long the
With this resolve k~indllng over his face, the
blacksmith stood there, with a cheerful light
beaming from his large grey eyes, when-a hand
was laid upon his shoulder.
He turned and behcld the face of a neighbor.
1t was a neighbours face, but there was an
awful agony stamping those plain features-there
was dark and terrible mystery speaking from
those lips, that moved and moved, but made no
sound.
For a moment that farmer tried 10 speak the
horror that convulsed his features,
At last, forcing the blacksmith along the
brown g~ravelled walk, now strewn with cinders,
he pointed to the smoking embers. There, there
amid that heap of black and smoking ruins,
the blacksmithbehe adark mass, of burnt flesh
and blackened bones.
Your 0ifeP ' shrieked the farmer, as his ag-
ony found words. "The British came in the
night, they'-and then he spoke that outrage
which the lip guiyers to think of, which the
heart grows palsied to tell-that outrage too foul
to name. "Your wife" he shrieked, pointing
to that hideous mass amid the smoking ruins
"the British they murdered your wife, they flung
her dead body into the 1ames-they dashed your
child against the hearthstone %
This was the farmers story.
And there, as the light of the breaking day
fell around the spot, there stood the husband,
the father, gazing upon that mass Of burned
flesh and bones-aN that oO0S once his Wife.
Do you ask me for the word that trembled
from his white lips? Do you ask me for the fire
that blazed in his eye!
/ cannot tell you. But can tell you that
there was a vow going up to Heaven from that
blacksmith's heart; that there was a clenched
hand, appraised in the light Of the breaking day
Yes, yes as the CLEAN of the autumnal dawn
broke around the spot, as the first CLEAN Of sun
light streamed over the peeled skull of that fair
young wife-she was that last night-there was.
vow going up to Heaven, the VOW Of a mad
dened heart and a~nguished brain,
How was that vow kept? Go there to Bran
DIVINE, and where the carnage gathers thickcst,
who're the 6nht is most bloody thern Won INV