The Cambria freeman. [volume] (Ebensburg, Pa.) 1867-1938, 1871-06-03

Soou uhaluteo iuafl, lonu OF neld sports,
and very well-to-do in the world. The
wealth he carried about his person would
not now be often found with one of his
standing; but from Fielding's novels, and
other sources, it is pretty clear that SER
geant in the English army occupied a
much higher social position in that age
than in the present.
The body had lain for nearly a year
before it was discovered Of the state in
which it was found, and the alleged ap>
pearance of The sergeant's ghost to the wit
ness, Alexander Macpherson alias Mac
glllas, the following is an account in that
persons own words, as his evidence was
taken down in court.
sin the summer of 1850, he found,
lying IN moss-bank in the hill OF Christie,
human body-at least the bones of hu-
man body, of which the flesh was mostly
CONSUMED, and he believed it to be the
body Of Sergeant Davies, because it,was
repOrted in the country that he had been
murdered in that Lil the year before
When he first found this body there was
bit If blue cloth upon it, pretty entire.
llsh cloth he also found the hair of the
deceased, which was of a dark mouse
coiUr, and tied about with black ribbon :;
he also observed some pieces of a striped
stuff. and found also lying there pair
of brogans, which had been made with
latches for buckles, which had beer cut
away by knife. BY the help of his
staff, he brought out the body, and laid
1t upon plain grond in doing whereof,
some of the bones were separated one
from another. For some days he was in
doubt what to do, but meeting with John
Growar in the moss, he told John what
he had found, and John bade him tell
nothing OF il, otherwise he would CONS
plain OF the deponent to John Shaw Of
Daldownie; upon which the deponent
resolved to prevent Crowar's complaint
and &c and tell Daldownie of it himself :;
and which having accordingly done, DaI>
downie desired him to conceal the matter,
and go and bury the body privately, as ii
would not be carried to kirk unkempt,
and that the same might hurt the country,
being under suspicion of being a rebel
country. Some few days thereafter he
acquainted Donald Farquharson of his
having seen the body of a dead man in
the bill which he took to be the body of
Sergeant Davies. Farquharson at first
doubted the truth of his information, till
the deponent told him that, a few nights
before, when he was in bed, vision ap-
peared to him as of man clad in blue.
who told the deponent, 81 am Sergeant
Davies > but before he told him so, the
deponent had taken the said visoin, at
first appearance, TO be real living man,
a brother of Donald Farquharson's.-
The deponent rose from his bed and fol-
lowed him to the door, and then it was.
as has been told, that he said he was
Sergeant Davies, who. had been murdered
In the hill of Christie near a year before,
and desired the deponent to go TO the
place he had pointed out, where he would
find his bones, and that he might 90 10
Donald FaIquharson and take his assists
ance to the burying of him. Upon Civ
ing Donald Fa, quharson this information,
Donald went along with him and found
the bones as he had informed Donald,
and then buried them with the help of
spade, which he tthe deponenD had along
with him and for putting what is above
deponed on out of doubt, depones that
the above vision was the occasion of his
going by himself TO see the dead body,
and which he did before he either spoke
to j ohm Gowar, Daldownie, or any other
body. While he was in bed another
night, after be had first seen the body by
himself, but had not buried it, the vision
again appeared naked, and reminded him
to bury the body ; and after that he spoke
TO the other folks above mentioned, and
at last complied, and buried the bones
aforementioned. Upon the Visions fiji st
appearance to the deponeut in his bed,
and after going out of the door, and be-
ing told by it he was Sergeant Davies,
the deponent asked him who it was that
bad murdered him, to which he made
this answer, that if the deponent had not
asked he might have told him, but as he
had asked him, he said he either could
not, or would not; but which of the two
expressions depOnent can not say. But
at the second time the vision made IFS APP
pearance to him, the deponent renewed
the same question; and then the vision
answered that it was the two men now
in the panel Cat the barr that had MUIR
dersd him. And being further interroga
ted in what manner the vision disappeared
from him first and last, depones that, after
the short Interviews aforementioned, the
vision at both times disappeared and van
ished out of his sight in the twinkling of
an eye and that, in describing the panels
by the vision before mentioned as his MUIR
derers, his words were, "Duncan Clark
and Alexander Macdonald depones that
the conversation betwixt the deponent and
the vision ,Uas IN The Irish language"
The idea of an English sergeant, even in
the exalted form of a spirit, being able to
speak Gaelic, startled the judge and jury,
although, as Sir Walter Scott remarks,
there is no greater stretch of Imagination