Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1872-11-14

nished and shaped like the ordinary flutes
and furnished with embouchoirs of brass. This
instrument seems to be perfect in all its parts,
and is a wonder of mechanical ingenuity and
skill. 1t is said to be the largest organ in the
United States, and cost s60,OOO
HUNK1DoR1.
"REMINISCENCES OF CHARLESTON.
Mrs. Petigru Carson contributes to the last
issue of Applston's Journal the following plea
SAINT sketch of old St. Michael's and its chime
of bells:
Very dear to the people of Charleston, South
Carolina, is St. Michaeps Church in that city,
which is said to have been built after model
furnished by Sir Christopher Wren, and CO.
pied from St. Martin stint -the-Fields, London.
The likeness to St. Martins is so strong that
no Charlestonian, on coming to London, needs
have that church pointed out The spire of
St. Michael's, however, is much the more
beautiful. Any one who had seen it would
remember the church, with it's old-fashioned
mahogany pulpit, and great brass chandeliers,
and high-back mahogany pews, where the de-
vout might pray, and the careless sleep un.
seen. But chiefly were the people proud of
their BELLS There was no such chime in the
colony when they were hung, and, after they
had changed their tune of God save the King
for Yankee Doodle, they never were any bells
in New York or Boston that came up to them
in their Fourth of July performances. Ofall
the works of mans hands, there is none which
seems to have such life of its own as bells.
How they sympathize with the people, giving
voice to their joys and their sorrows How,
with prophets voices, they speak to each man
in his own tongue! And now, sometimes,
like mocking spirits, they urge the mad fury
of the mob with peals of vengeance and tri-
umph, which in the ears of the wiser few are
knell of despair.
When the British took Charleston in 1880,
they stabbed their horses in the church, and
unhanging the bells, sent them off to London,
where they were dumped on the Tower wharf,
and left unnoticed for many years. At last,
the vestry of St. Michaels received letter,
bidding them expect their bells by certain
ship sailing from London. The people went
in procession to bring up from the ship their
beloved bells, which they had never hoped to
listen to again, and with prayers and thanks
giving they were replaced in the church tower.
The pious benefactor never made himself
known, but he was supposed to have been
some British officer who had been at the taking
of Charleston. For seventy years, did those
bells regulate the social life of the city. For,
not only did they call to worship, and cele-
brate all occasions of public joy and sorrow,
but nightly they rang curfew which ruled
everybody's movements. 1t was intended to
warn the negroes home at o'clock in winter,
10 in summer; after that hour, they might
not 20 into the streets without written pass.
The nimbe negro often eluded the statute,
giving leg-bail to the "guardman," but the
whites put themselves under the rule, of their
own accord. All visitors were expected to
take leave at bell-ring, and they punctually
departed at the same moment that Cufy was
brushing along to gain his gate before the tap
of the drum should make him amenable to
the law against strollers latter hours" as it
was called.
It would not suit this sketch to recall the
memories of the day when the United States
flag, lowered from Fort Sumter, was brought
up to the city, amid hush so general, one
Nigh have thought the people repented then
of this rash act, till some one ordered the bells
to ring mad clamor, and with shouts Of ex-
ultation, they drowned the voice that still
warned them to forbear.
Time went on, and Charleston, behind her
defences of sand, resisted all the efforts to car
ry her. During the 500 (546) days of bonn:
bardment, all the lower part Of the town had
to be abandoned Houses and churches were
shattered, the cannon balls tore up the very
grave-yards, and the bones of the dead were
scattered. Yet the spire of St. MichaePs was
untouched. Perhaps the cannoneers tried to
spare it-perhaps good angels guarded it,
But, what neither the malice ofthe enemy nor
the spite of fortune did, the people themselves
effected. For the bells were taken down and
sent to Columbia, to be cast into cannon.
Gen. Beauregard, perhaps shocked at the des-
ecration, pronounced them unfit for the pur-
pose and the fate which heaped up at Colum-
bia for safe-kecping everything of value in
the State, there detained the bells also. Then
Sherman's army passed through, leaving its
track as of lightning. A party of halfdrun-
ken soldiers out for lark and for plunder,
were accosted by a negro, who offered to show
them the bells which had rung in secession.
"Never," said the men, "shall they play that
tune again p and they smashed them into a
hundred pieces
Sad was the return to the desolated homes,
and the meetings in the dumb church, to which
no miracle might now restore the voice Of the
chimes they loved. But they were men Of
pluck still, and as soon as they had shaken
themselves up and provided for the first press
ing needs, they resolved to tax themselves to
the utmost to get a new chime.
Scarcely had the rector bread, and the vestry
and congregation were all very poor, but they
wrote to g. R. Prioleau, of London, to inquire
the cost of new set. This gentleman had
lived so long in England as to have become
almost an Englishman, with a fair English
wife and bluff handsome English children, but
his heart stirred at the recollection Of the
dear old voices that had called him in child
hood, and he undertook the task with low
ing zeal that brought about the most surpris-
ing results. There was no record at Charles
Ton of where the bells came from. But Mr..
Proleau searched the directory for the oldest
founders of the city, and went from one to the
other until, at Meares & Co., White Chapel,
| London, firm which has been in existence