Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1871-07-18

loading muskets in the direction of the people
on the housetops, then, dropping their mus
kets fred second volley straight into the
face of the crowd A soldier of the Eighty
fourth regiment picked out the man with the
musket on the top of the house and dropped
him in his tracks. The other platoonss OF MIL
itary. who had not been ordered to lire, re-
NAMED perfectly STILL standing quietly to their
arms while their comrades inaugurated the
business of the defence.
In moment the scene of the parade was
changed to fearful battlefield. The multi
tude. ringleaders and all, took to their heels,
white with fear, and rushed up the cross
streets, leaping into cellars and unfinished
houses, crowding behind doorsteps or falling
fiat on their faces in the cutters. The street
and pavement were Uttered here and there
with dead bodies of men and women, some of
whom had fallen with outstretched hands in
the stiff performance of Immediate DEATH
while others, uttering low means, clenched at
the warm stones and gazed in helpless agony
for relief. Blood trickled everywhere. A man
was seen leaning from second story window
in the act of vomiting blood Purple streams
flowed from his nose and forehead and ran IN
a rill to the curbstone. Cowardice and curlos-
ity had met their penalty in moment OF prov
ocation, and those smooth-faced boys scattered
death left and right in the quiet consciousness
of a duty demanded. Then, after little
pause, the music struck up again from the diff
ferent bands, and the whole procession, leav-
ing its dead still on the street, marched in the
direction of Madison square.
A few of the rabble had slipped away before
the firing of this volley, resolving to head off
the procession at Seventh avenue and Twenty
third street, and give it similar treatment
But a portion of the Seventh and Twenty-third
regiments, with mounted police, got around
ahead of them, divining their intention, and
before the military could use their muskets the
police tumbled in and dubbed the Williams on
their heads and faces, The miserable multi
tude were too late-but this was a sort Of mil
itary who had not recently been seen in the
streets of the city-slipped off into by-streets
and that a long distance between them and the
foray.
When all were gone and the right of pro-
cession had been INDICATED, it was an awful
scene for an American city to see these bleed
ing and shattered forms of men and women
littering the pavements and stones of Eighth
avenue and the cross-streets. Priests now ap-
peared upon the ground, seeking to perform
the last Office for some past praying for, and
little groups of relatives, children, and broth
ers with disordered hair and dress, and tears
and imprecations blended. stopped over the
bodies and added to the hideousness of the
result.
After little while carts and furniture wag-
ons were impressed by the police, and one, af-
ter another the warm but lifeless bodies were
laid in these vehicles-the heads toward the
tail of the Garland they moved over toward
Broadway and passed the line of hotels, carry
ing melancholy and panic wherever they ap-
peared.
The victorious procession kept straight on
down Eighth avenue, cheered and applauded
from the houses and feebly hooted from the
streets, until, at Fourteenth street, it marched
to Union square, where its reception was ex-
traordinary Loud acclaims came from all ho-
tel guests, who represented every part of the
United States, while from Madison square and
from safe distances the mob still hurled occa-
sional stones and bricks, and made fiendish out
cries. The undaunted Orangemen losing not a
man, and grit all round with a wall Of protec-
ton, still filed around the Worth monument,
and marched down to the Cooper Institute,
when it was disbanded.