Raftsman's journal. [volume] (Clearfield, Pa.) 1854-1948, 1859-02-23
CLEARFIELD PA. WEDNESDAY FEBRUARY g. 1850

herself land regarding as nonght the increasing
| pain in her wounded side, prepai ed to go for
assistance. The nearest settlement was two
miles up the valley. but, what to her was fat
| igue and exposure.
She sought the thicket where she had hid
den her infant it still slumbered land careful
y removing it she brought it to the side of
its father. Then divcstisg herself of her shawl
and apron, she wrapped the injured man ten
derly in their folds and committing her hus-
band and child to the care of Heaven she set
forth upon her errand, carrying pine torch
to light the tortuous way. Night hung dense
and palpable over the earth not a star or a
a gleam of. light over the battlements of the
grim mountains; but she faltered not. Wild
animals infested the whole valley, but the
panther shrunk away from her white face with
growl of discomfort, and the cowardly wolf
hid himself in the underwood as her torch
went by.
At length after toisome tramp of an hour
or more, she reached the dwelling of the
nearest settler, and aroused his family.
Peter Kenney and his three stalwart sons
were dismayed when they looked into the face
of their visitor, with the blood trickling down
her dress from the cash inI her side but their
counrenances burned with impatience when
she related TO them in few hurried words the
events of the night, begging them to go with
her to her husband.
No entreaties were needed to move those
hardy fellows to action in where hu-
manity was concerned, and in the space of
five minutes rude litter had been constructed
of interaced boughs, across which bed and
some quilts were laid, and then each armed
with lis trusty rife, the four men set forth
for the scene of desOlation.
Ellen Moreland refused to remain at Mr..
Kenney's house during the absence of the
men on the errand of mercy, and not all the
entreaties and eSpostulations of the kind.
hearted settlers wife could move her from her
purpose. She must go back to her treasures,
and so, declining to occupy the litter, she
went on before the little cortege-faith and
hope lending vigor to her frame and elasticity
TO her step.
When one of his sons were urging her to
accept of the little conveyance, Mr.. kenney
said
s.Let her alone, John, the good Lord will
give her strength and shut the jaws of the
panther
The devoted woman reached her husband
some time before the others, and she was more
than rewarded for her exertions by the favor
able change which had come ever him. A
faint color flushed his face, and the handker-
chieI she had bound around his head, had
staunched the flow of blood.
Little Rachel, nesting up close to her
fathers side, still slept-onc of her tiny
hands da5bled in the blood which had oczed
from the wound in his forehead-the other
unconscious innocence and beauty.
They put the father and child together mp
on the litter, and then went out to look at the
smoking ruins of the cabin. The charred re-
mains of the savages could be perceived amid
the embers, and they left them there undis-
turbcd; feeling that Ellen Moreland had done
only her duty in thus destroying them The
next day, the settlers of the upper valley
gathered together, and casting the body OF
the uDburned Indian into the ashes with the
rest, they covered the place with the sods of
the hill side.
James NJ Ireland lived but his illness was long
and tedious. He has before him ever pres
ent remainder of the heroism of his wife, for
since that night her right arm has hung use
less at her side. The wound inflicted by the
Indians scalping knife was near the arm pit,
and although it did not mortify, it palsied the
vital energy of the limb.
Her husband blcsses her every day for her
heroic conduct at the time when he was bro't
so near the domains of death, and her daugh-
ter, now the wife of distinguished statesman,
prays that she may bestow upon her two no
BILE boys something of the spirit and bravery
of their grandmother.
The burnt cabin was never rebuilt; More
land removed to Dover, from thence to Port
land Me-, where he became an extensive ship
builder-but he never forgot the night of
| terror.