Northern Ohio journal. [volume] (Painesville, Ohio) 1872-1896, 1873-08-09

| WAS shattered. and save the three de-
fects lust mentioned the skeleton, when
put together, was without blemish. The
| tree in falling, should have mentioned,
was rent asunder-a task not dIfhcuIt OF
accomplishment when [ refer to the
fact that an examination 1ound that at
| some remote date the very heart of
the oak had been cleft by lightning.
| From spot twenty feet from the
ground upwards to the first great fork
| a distance of ten feet-a hollow extended,
and from this cavity the skeleton had
been hurled. If we but knew who he
| was, thought my Informant, Mr.. Rog-
ers, and, strange to say, few minutes
| later the twain discovered that the tree
had also disgorged thrilling history.
An old-fashioned leathern pocket or
memorandum book lay i'll remarkable
state of preservation, which no doubt
had been dropped into the rent made by
the lightning, and thus been preserved
while its master decayed. A few brass
buttons of old and unique pattern were
found near the memorandum, but it is
with the latter We have to deal. This
old leather pnrse entirely moneyless,
contained sundry papers covered with
rude pencilings quite difficult to trace,
as they were written on the backs of ar
my passes and military consignments
WHICH ddt0u OdSh - sO- uA1
Rogers conveyed the bones to his house,
and set about to read the memorandum
of the captive of that tree. But owing
to his falling eyesight he could decipher
but little, and this little a conglomerate
mass of disconnections. But still he
read enough to learn that the eyes that
once shone in the now orbless sockets |
often looked upon Washington in the
heat of battle, and amid the SHOWS of
Valley Forge; and the skeleton arm
when covered with flesh and muscle had
struck many stalwart blows for our
country. The mans name, as gathered |
from the papers, was Roger Wander
berg, native of Lancaster, Pa, and a |
captain in the Revolutionary army. He |
was an aid to Washington during the
retreat across the Jerseys. and served
time in Arnold's headquarters at West
Point. In 1871 he marched with St.
Clair against the northwestern Indians,
and in the famous outbreak of that Gen
eral Oh the Wabash, November 3, of the
year just written, he was wounded and
captured. But while being conveyed to
the Indian town at Upper Piqua-a his
torical place well known to your readers
he affected his escape, but found him
self hard pressed by his savage foes. He
saw the hollow in the oak. and despite
the mangled arm, and with the aid of
a beech that grew beside the giant then,
he gained the haven, and dropped there
in. Then came fearful discovery. He
had miscalculated the depth of the hol-
low and there was no escape. Oh, the
story told by the diary of the oaks des-
pairing prisoner! How rather than sur
render to the torture of the stake he
chose death by starvation; how he wrote
hls diary in the uncertain light and the |
SHOWS! Here is one entry Oh the diary: |
November 10th.-Five days without
food! When | sleep dream of luscious |
fruits and .foacing streams. The stars |
laugh at my mysery! 1t is showing |
now. | freeze while | starve. God pity |
me!
The italicised words were supplied by |
Mr.. Rogers. as the trembling hand oft |
times refused to indite plainly. Never |
was such record of suffering traced by |
human hand before. The entries COW
cred Il period of eleven days, and in dis
jointed sentences is told the story of st. |
Clair's defeat. Mr.. Rogers has written
to Lancaster to ascertain if any descend
ants of the ili-fated Captain live; if so,
they shall have his bones.
Should no such descendants survive,
the narrator of the discovery proposes
that the patriotic people of Miami Coun-
ty shall erect monument to the luckless
captains memory. Perhaps, however,
the matter will be settled by a conces-
sion of the military skeleton to the ac
quisitive Mr.. Barnum, who, in that
event, could not do better than secure
the teller of the above story, also, to eX-
plain the aforesaid addition to his great
moral show.