Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1854-02-23
From the Indiana Free Democrat.
THE TORY.

occasional illusions to certain great uncle of
ours, who in time of the Revolutionary war
was hung for Tory; and have u very dis
tinct remembrance of the mingled indignation
and horror with which l listened to the recital
indignation, that any one 80 nearly connected
with my patriotic self should have taken up
arms against his country, and horror at the
fearful expiation of his crime. 1t seemed to
me kind of family bugbear, and either from
delicacy on my part to ask, Or on the part of
others to communicate, my boyish curiosity was
mover gratifed with a. da.aiiea recount of this
precious bit of family tragedy and | might
have gone through life haunted by sort of in
definite sense of ancestral crime, but that hap
pened to mention the subject few months since,
while on visit to venerable uncle--a man of
more than four-score years and the last one of
the old race--who with the plased garrulity of
age when talking of its early days, gave me a
minute history of the whole affair; and | must
confess to a material modification of my boyish
feeling of indignation and to the substitution
of something like indignation of the hero of
the story in its stead.
The story sifted from the mass of words with
which it was given to me, is simply this
1t seems our progenitors were originally from
the mountains of Wales, whence they emigrat-
ed many years previous to the Revolution to d
mountainous district of Virginia, where their
original scmi-civilized condition was not much
improved by contact with the something less
than half civilized pioneer inhabitants Of their
new mountain home
At the time of the breaking out of the war
OF independence our great grandfather's family
consisted Of some half dozen stalwart sons
rough and hardy as the mountains among which
they were reared. One Of these, rejoicing i'll
the most unchristian Christian name Of Wa
mock, young man of about q years, was just
then engaged in completing his education at a
little pine log establishment for forms sake
ycleped school house. But with commenda-
Bile zeal for his country's welfare, upon the first
alarm OF war, he left the fowery path of litora-
ture in company with a younger brother, to
fight for his country's independence.
At that time throughout southern Virginia
and the Carolinas, the two parties-Whig and
Tory-were nearly equal in strength, and it
Guerrilla warfare which was carried on, for old
7 friends and even relations 10 meet III deadly
! conflict. In some such engagement as this, in
which our hero took part, an intimate friend
and old schoolmate of his who joined the Tories
was taken prisoner AS usual in such cases,
where personal resentment is added to party
luminosity, no mercy was shown, and sentence
of death was pronounced upon him. But as
night was coming on, the execution of the
sentence was delayed till morning, and in the
meantime our hero was stationed as one of the
sGntinels to guard him. Towards morning the
other guards, weary and half drunk, fell asleep,
and the prisoner watching his opportunity
, appealed to him with all the energy of despair
and in the name of t.ioir former friendship to
save him from his impending doom. For time
E he resisted the appeal, but at length his better
nature gained the ascendency-hc cut the cords
that bound him and let him make his escape.
The rage and fury of the whole party next
morning upon finding their prisoner gone and
themselves cheated of their expected vengenco
can more easily be imagined than described
Knowing theformer friendship of our hero fol
the prisoner all eyes were at once turned upor
the former as the guilty one, and voices hoars,
, with suppressed rage demanded "where is oul
, prisoner! Too proud and unbending to den,
, or equivocatc, he told how and why he had re
leased him.
Now followed IA scene of angry debate durin;
which his life hung upon single thread, fo
: many were clamorous for his instant execution
20 and for time his own life seemed doomed t.
- atone for the life he had saved. But milde
counsels at lenght prevailed, and with nue.
a grumbling on the part of the more vindictive
his sentence was finally modified to $50 lashe
J. we'll laid on upon the back.
n He begged that they would spare him the in
: dignity of having his hands tied-that he woul
J, stand and take it without hinching-but in vain
10 He was tied to a tree with his arms around
It and his back barred to the lash, and in that DC
d stion received his most unmerciful and unmerit
d ed chastisement--but without tear or groar
e for his unbending stubbornness and strength c
will, was unequalled by his physical strengt
and power of endurance.
/, Cut loose from the tree, he stood momer
e turned slowly round and looked each ma
IS full in the face with a glance of concentrate
= hate and unequenchable malignity Then pla,
% ing the remnant of his tattered garments upo
t. his head while from his mutilated back til
5, blood streamed to the ground, he vowed befol
ID heaven eternal vengence to them and theirs
lie and with word of scorn, mutilated as he wa
dared any ttco of them to single combat. H
g words and manner appalled, even the hardy ar
savage men to whom they were addressed, ar
none accepted the challenge.
ID do not well well remember the facts, eve
if they would be of sufficient interest, to tra
rs minutely his future course Suffice it to say
y, fearfully kept his vow. lie lived but to
avenged upon his tormentors All his good w
e. turned to evil, and all the energies of stror
ey will absorbed in the pursuit of vengenc
en- Joining himself to a band of Tory outlows
became their captain, and during the troublo
he times of the Revolution was the terror of
e- wide district of country All who favored II
nd cause with which his tormentors were allie