Gallipolis journal. [volume] (Gallipolis, Ohio) 1837-1919, 1858-10-14
From the Louisville Journal.
BRADDoCK's FIELD.
By Erv.r. HEMPsrEAD.

with time are white
Locks that around my infant brow hung like
the plumes of Night,
This ear is dull, this arm is weak, these eyes
8 with age are dim,
That heard the roar, that strOve,. that gazed
!. upon the carnage grim;
/ was a youth, loved my gun, a sword. the
books that tell -
of plains where wars hot, crashing bolts on
frantic thousands fell;
twas upon those fearful days when Ger the
s far frontier
The death-whoop at the dead of night smote
q. on the settlers ear;
To father, mother, sister, friend, we spake the
low farewell,
With nodding plume and jarring drum down
many 8 savage dell,
Der rock and plain and roaring stream, by
-, sunlight and by star,
To meet the lurking foe in fight we wandered
long and far,
While foremost in our daring band, in manly
bloom rode on,
Bold Braddecks and the stately form Of brave,
young Washington;
Till on a time, one balmy morn within the
ringing June,
While woods put on their richest hues, brooks
sang their blithest tune,
Where blue Monongahela shOne through
banks OF pleasant green,
We stood and saw his smile leap up the clasp
Ing bows between;
1t was lonely spot and wild, where never
white mans tread
Had come to scare the browsing deer or crush
the violet's head,
: Rut where, as down the verdant wilds, the
river slid and foamed,
The beaver reared his mimic town, the bear
? and otter roamed,
And all the sounds that stirred the gloom
were but the panther's howl,
The clamor of the wheeling crow, or sob of
hooded OWL
said within my soldiers heart that it were
well to lie
In such spot, so still and green, when DER
my swimming eye
Amidst the roar and crack of guns by scalp
ing knife or ball
The winter of the grave should come that ever
comes to all
Down by the rivers marge we toilcd through
all the summer day,
Then turned into the neighboring hills, a
sleep and rocky way
Our step was free, our thoughts were light, as
step and thought should be
OF those who for their homes and wives march
on TO victory,
Andy dreaming, see the conflict DER and
through The war-eloud dun,
Hear Bursting roundfthe deice huzza wineiri
saws the day is wonl -
- But sonetimeso'ero our warrior pride CHASTITY
glimpse would come,
OF limbs gnawed by the snarling wolf and
of the lonely home,
And darklng on the soul dull, blue lip
would whisper well,
How death might lurk in summer leaves, and
from the messy dell
The rifle launch its bloody hail and roar the
savage yell.
Farther and farthsr on we toiled with cannon,
blade and plume,
Till round us like mighty wing hung the
old forest gloom;
The woodfowers gave pleasant smell, the
wind went laughing by,
We heard its football on the boughs betwixt us
and the sky;
Huge glistening pines and beeches wOve an
ebon dome of shade
Through which the sun in fiery globes and
golden islets played
Upon the leaves, the dull dead leaves that
cracked to our tre"d-
That crackle shot across my soul shudder
and a-dread,
Ny heart grew sick, a viewless hand seemed
on my shoulder laid
That held me back until I grew of leaf and
breeze afraid,
n
all that leafy place,
And said I never, nevermore should see my
mothers facet
Up through lonesome dell we wound where
smooth, green moses DER
The twisted roots and rough, brown stones
had spread yielding floor;
.Luxuriant DER the broad hillside the knotted
laurel grew,
Aud sharp. gray rocks against the limbs their
wrinkled brows upthrew:
And now a stiffness came that seemed the
very winds TO fill,
No murmur trembled in the dell, no whisper
on the hill,
The silence tingled on our ears it was so deep
and still;
And nothing told how, lurking round, all
burning for the fray,
Eight hundred painted sayages with leveled
rifles lay,
Till. flashing from a caverned rock, on leaf
and blade and plume,
A solitary musket-h fash lit up the woody
gloom;
And he who next before me walked with one
tremendous leap,
Sank down upon the hollow stones in the un
waking sleep,
We started, bent our eager gaze along the
bordering shade,
Where'er the matted vines hold for couchani
foe had made;
A moment-and from rock and air and eartI
there burst yell,
Such as the gnashing fends may ring from
the red jaws of hell
a roar as when in earthquakes lips noun
tain splits and sways,
And oceans leap their rocky bourne, and cite:
crash and blazeI
We stood like men and storm for storm back
on the foe returned
Till one red, kissing wall of fire the reeling
valley burned,
And down as roars the trampling hail upon
the tender grain,
So rushed upon our startled band that mur
derous battle rain;
And madly back, through storm for storm
our bullets smote like rain,
They dashed amidst viewless foe as harm
lessly and Yais.
Girt in by death, with quivering hearts, yei
unsubdued and brave,
We stood, recoiled, rushed on and wheeled
each o'erhis open gravel
From rock and brake, and blasted truuk, be
hind, aside, before,
The havoc rushed, the deluge blazed, and
boiled the savage roar;
n Our friends, our foes, woods, earth, and sky,
grew atremendous one,
Ihat reeked:in gore and rocked in, fame and
round US yagned and spun;
Ihere seized our sinking hearts, of life, one
Wild and lurid thought,
80 neree, tyrannic, and intense, we knew moi
thatwe fought,