Essex County herald. [volume] (Guildhall, Vt.) 1873-1964, 1875-05-22
A VERMONT HEROINE.
A Woman of the OIden Time and the Work
She Did.

She Did.
As / read in the Vermont Gazetteer the
early history of Vermont, and see what
our mothers before us did to help to
bring this once wild region into state
of cultivation, and compare our present
situation with theirs, and hear young
women say such and such is not women s
work, and 6" would not do as Mrs. A.
or B. does," blush of shame comes
over me for our present generation of
women. Allow me to refer you to one
instance recorded in the Gazetteer:
Wallace relates distressing scene, by
an alarm spread through the country in
the summer of 1777. He was at Charles
town, NewHampshire, when an American
scouting party came in with party of
scouts from Burgoynes army which they
had captured. Papers were found upon
the prisoners stating that three detach-
ments of British soldiers and tories were
to be sent out, one to Newbury, one to
Charlestown and the other to Royalton.
This was stratagem of Burgoyne's to
divert the Americans from his army.
The scouts were sent out to be taken and
succeeded wonderfully. The news
spread like electricity throughout the
country. Wallace made all speed for
Thetford, where he had settled six miles
from the river He found on reaching
Thetford the people, by order of the
committee of safety, passing in from
Strafford and other settlements in the
greatest CONSERVATION. He met, between
the place where Thetford meeting house
now stands and his habitation, crowd
of men, women and children. He looked
for his wife in the caravan and finding
her not in the midst put spurs to his
steed. Arriving at his hut he found his
wife sticking by the stuff. Having no
way to transport her goods to the river
she had resolved to wait and see if there
was cause for all this trepidation and
flight. She had, however, commenced
carrying their household stuff into the
wood and covering it with bushes. They
both together now completed the work
the wife had SO heroically begun, and
then both mounted their horses and rode
off for the settlement at the river.
The next day Wallace took another
man and went and brought in his goods
and then enlisted to go in pursuit of
Burgoyne, concluding to so press the
lion in his den that his whelps should
not be at liberty to go abroad and devas
tate the surrounding country. This was
the effect of Burgoyne's stratagem
generally; it returned upon his own
head. After Wallace had gone in pur-
suit of Burgoyne, and the alarm had
somewhat subsided, Mrs. Wallace travel
ed back six miles to see to their crops.
She found the oats ripe for harvesting,
and many of them lodged. She was
alone. No man could be procured to
assist in gathering them. Every man
that could be spared had gone to war.
Nothing daunted, however, she took a
scythe and moved them, dried them,
raked them into punches, bound them
and stacked them in good style; she
then took an ak, cut psles, fenced them
about and went back to the river. When
the corn stalks were ripe she went out,
cut them, bound them and put them on
her stack of oats. In like manner she
went out, dug her potatoes, and then
went to work clearing some ground
which had been felled and burnt over
the year before; and that fall herself
cleared and sowed one acre of wheat.
Burgoyne and his army surrendered
October II, 1777. Wallace returned to
his hut in December after, where he and
his wife lived through the winter with
out any chimney, hearth or floor, except
ing three or four loose boards to set
their pole bedstead upon, which was
corded with elm bark. The following
year they procured some sheep, which
they had to yard in pen near the house
every night. Wallace was at work at
the river at a certain time, and his wife
could not find her sheep to yard them in
the evening. AS soon as it was dark the
wolves set up fearful bowling, as it
seemed, within twenty rods of the house.
Frightened for her sheep, she sailed
forth and discharged a gun she had
loaded in the house &C. to let the wolves
know something was there besides NUT
ton" At midnight she reloaded and
went forth and fired again, and before
daylight they heard from her the third
time. At sunrise she went out and found
all her sheep safe near the pen.
Here, on this farm which they hat
cleared up, being among the first settlers
of Thetford, this worthy couple lye(
and died Mr.. Wallace died February
7, 1888, aged eighty, Mrs. Wallace dice
May 81, aged eighty-one years. Theil
children were eleven, of whom nint
lived to settle in life and raise up fami
lies. Mr.. Powers speaks of them as be
ing distinguished patriots and professeC
Christians for many years.