Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1871-07-17

housetop with a loaded musket, which he
discharged directly into the lines, and stooped
behind a chimney to reload it.
Suddenly the foremost regiment came to a
halt, and word was passed in quick success
sion to those furthest in the rear to stand
upon their arms likewise, the head of the
procession had now passed the Grand Opera
House and turned a little way into Twenty
third street, where it met a very different sort
OF reception ladies and men, from the hand
some dwellings on either side, waving their
handkerchief and cheering the beleagured
beings who had just passed through the Val
ley and Shadow in quitting Eighth avenue for
more respectable highway.
At the instant of the halt volleys of stones
and the scattering sound of pistols redoubed
Nearly everybody of common prudence had
already sought safety by retiring. The tall
horseman at the head of the Orange process
sion turned about and rode the whole length
of his line, wiping his brow meantime. He
was the subject of admiration for all who
were not envenomed, and these looked upon
him with deeper hate than ever. He was
struck with violence in the shoulder by an old
shoe, but, paying no attention to this matter,
he wheeled his horse and resumed his place
at the head of his line.
| Suddenly a word of command, unintellgi-
BILE to all but the troops, started from near
| Wenty -tuiTu STREET, anu was Tepeateu from
| officer to officer until it expired nearly up
Twenty-seventh street. In an instant the
troops deployed; flank companies filed out to
the left and the right in the twinkling of an
| eye three platoons of men emptied their
hreech-loading muskets in the direction of
the people on the housetops, then dropping
their muskets fired a second volley straight
into the face of the crowd. A soldier of the
Eighty fourth regiment picked out the man
..-,tE . no, ,lrze, 4 r. Al
dropped him in his tracks. The other pla-
toons of military, who had not been ordered
to fire, remainedperfectly still, standing quiet
ly to their arms while their comrades inaugu-
rated the business of the defence.
In moment the scene of the parade was
changed to a 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 |
Hat on their faces in the cutters. The street |
and pavement were Uttered here and there |
with dead bodies of men 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 ag- |
ony for relief. Blood trickled everywhere. |
A man was seen leaning from a second story
window in the act of vomiting blood. Purple
streams flowed from his nose and forehead
and ran in rill to the curstbene. Coward
ice and curiosity had met their penalty in
of provocation, and those smooth
faced boys scattered death left and right in
the quiet consciousness of duty demanded
Then, after little pause, the music struck
up again from the different bands, and the
whole procession, leaving its dead still on the |
street, marched in the direction of Madison |
square.
few OF the rabble had slipped away be- |
fore the firing of this volley, resolving to |
hesd 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 villains on their heads and faces. |
The miserable multitude were too late-but |
this was sort of military who had not re- |
Gently been seen in the streets of the city |
slipped off into by streets and that long dis
lance between them and the foray.
When all were gone and the right of the |
had been .vindicated, it was an aw-
full scene for an American city, to see these |
bleeding and shattered forms of men and wo- |
men littering the pavements and stones of
Eighth avenue and the cross streets. Priests |
now appeared upon the ground, seeking to |
perform the last office for some past praying |
for, and little groups of relatives, children |
and brothers with distorted hair and dresses, |
and tears and imprecations blending, stopped |
over the bodies and added to the hideousness |
of the result.
After little while carts and furniture and |
wagons were impressed by the police, and |
one after another the warm but lifeless bodies |
were laid in these vehicles-the heads toward
the tail of the Garland they moved over to-
ward Broadway and passed the line of hotels
| carrying melancholy and panic wherever they
appeared.
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 march
ed to Union square, where its reception was
extraordinary. Loud acclaims came from
all hotel guests, who represented every part
of the United States, while from Madison
square, and from safe distances, the mob
hurled occasional stones and bricks, and made
fendish outcries. The undaunted Orange
men losing not man, and girt all around
with wall of protection, still filed around
the Worth monument, and marched to the
Cooper Institute, where it was disbanded.