Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1873-06-26
"OLD WILEY =

Who cares in this crowd what Homer -ty.
OF the warning men in the ancient day
What N tiers 1t now to you or me
Though the HAD or odyssey
Nay tell OF the time when Trojan corse
Was trampcd by the foot of a Grecian hor-c,
Thou II the cplc song of the bard may state
How Achille fell at the sc@an gate?
But it stan. les a world that now come down
To TIL OF a man from my native wn.
o. q man obscure, unknown and plain,
But "ho once belonged to the llth of Mai: q.
When Slavery pres,ed by Free dom hand
Fired up the heart OF a Beaurcgard,
And the first red shot on Sumpter fell,
And the eagle scre med like a scream from hell,
when her shriek went out Ger vale and crag
As She chung like death to the d ar old flag,
And the trst Kind look that she got was one
From man named Robert Anderson,
iclt, somehow, and wrote and said
We had Il biz, Old truubla ahead.
With alt my faith in God and such,
With all my regon-and tn At want much
My faith want clear and my hope want uright
mt Daniel +. Wiley " ent into the ngh.
They called him "Old Wiley" up there, I'm sure
It's term Oft use when our clothes get poor.
He aid the wall and lie sawed the wood
For and others in the neighborhood.
HeneYer could Lecture and never could speak
One word OF grammar, and couldn't read Creek,
Though he dWelt in that old schouhouse, It's trIe,
Where the old road butts at the avenue:
Through his leaky boots YOU could see his feet,
rs he toilei for his DAILY bread 10 eat.
For many palm can never hold
The sordid duet that is scraped from gold.
Though he telled the rees and he titled the lands
with his brawny arms amt his horny hands,
It. never entered a soldiers brain
That Wiley would ever fight or train,
And never getting draft or call
lie saw ed the wood and he laid the wall.
One day to my village two men rode down
Yes both cane over from "Stetson town.
Aud one was General Hill believe
He hadn't on then that Empty S}eere
| could told them quick he would never yr'"
For a one right arm on the Deep Run Held,
And the other fellow with Hin they say
~ General Plaisted who talks to-day.
Old Wiley and were standing DER,
lie saving wo Il at my Office door.
A the meu from otetson town fodo by
\ neighbor of mine was standing nigh
With his traitor lips to the startled ar
He Kissed the flag that was floating there.
Like granite post old Wiley stood,
And his Old saw dropped from the hali-sawed wood,
Then he hoisted the strap round his big broad hips,
And he crumbed the pipe meath his firm, blue lips,
And his burnt, tanned face gave hendiSh sm"e'
But never word did he speak the while
TIL he gowCred At The man hard by, and when
lie taunted that Union nag again,
Then his tortured nerves like q serpent coued,
And these tough words from the old man boiled:
Says he, "dld you hear how that devil Kissed:
BY -, Squire, Pm going to enlistI'-
Though he split huge log, he couldn't stand
/ he thought of a riit id his native land.
And he did enl st, for the brave OH soul,
With his name on the gallant Plaisted's roll,
For the cast of die for a loss or gain
With the.gory famed Old 18th of Maine.
For Il mortal fray with his kith and kind
Left dying wife and a child behind
Marched OUT to the front where he fought and bled
And he came back MANNED, and he now is dead.
With his folded arms he lies so still
In cold sound sleep on the Crowell hill.
wish knew ii he felt the least
As he felt when our fathers flag was hissed
| For he slumbers there meath "a beetling cray
By the side of the one who Missed the flag.
| As we go, all pale, with the boatman DER
In our final voyage to the other shore,
| Mid the fearful surge of the rolling tide
| Sometimes you know
| That friend and foe
Will crowd and cuddle down, side by side