Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1886-04-07

Marshall and others, met to decide where
the University of Virginia should be To-
Gated, in 1918, Lexington, Staunton, and
Charlottesville being the contestants. 1t
must have been after that date that John
Morrison and Claudius Buster became resi-
dents of the town.
Because of Mrs. Shorts death that part
of the town was thought to be haunted, and
he was deemed brave man who would go
from the lower to the upper town, or rfee
rersa, in dark night. Joseph Morrison
was making the trip on very dark night,
when black COW with a white face slowly
got up among the chinquepin bushes by bis
path. He put out at a 10:4O speed for his
home, and bursting open the door at home,
calculated, +" Buck Rabbit might have
beat me, but brother Johns race-mare
couldn't"
Inasmuch as there are two memorable
tragic events that occurred in the early part
of this century, and both located by tradi-
tion near the ePunch Bowl,'' famous
spot more than mile from town, and nsar
Mr.. John D. Booker's, and on the right of
the pike going East, we will give this cor
rect history, derived from the only two per-
sons, whose memory can be relied upon,
who have given US the details
Jacob 1mboden, as we believe it was, and
brother of the late George, father of Gen.
John D., had for some time been living in
the family of Capt. Sam'l Steele, who COM
manded one of the sixteen companies from
Augusta. in the war of '12, and father of
Sam'l H. Steele, was going into Waynes-
boro' one night. He had been for some
time managing Capt Steele's hands and may
have incurred the enmity Of some of
his negroes. He was murdered and his
body found the next morning near the juno
tion of the Greenville road with the Scotts-
vile pike, and near the Ballard Smith res
idenee. Several of the negroes were tried,
but nothing was proved.
There is some doubt as to which of the
two incidents occurred first, yet the inter-
val between was not wide one.
There was On the site of the brick man.
sion, built by the late John McCue, a
Frazer family, sometimes spelled Frazier,
among the earliest as they were among
the most prominent of that day One
James Paula native Irishman, born a
poet, who couldn't talk, except in rhyme,
married one of the daughters. He had
been previously married, as we believe, in
ireland, and had three sons. One of them,
Thomas. like the father, too fond of the
14Oh be joyful, y was walking into Waynes
boro', as is remembered, near the "Punch
Bowl" some one passing, was leading a
horse, when Thomas, with permission, per-
haps, from the party leading it, mounted it,
the animal plunged and throwing him
against pine tree, Qately cut down by
Mr.. BreHnaman, on the left side of the
Scottsviile pike. going easD he was instant
ly killed. There are those to this day, in
the neighberhood, who could hardly be
persuaded to go into the town, on a dark
night, for doctor, past the "Puneh Bowl"
believing that unlike Joe Morrison AID the
white-faced COW he mistook for the ghost
of 'Mary Short,'' they would most assuredly
see either that of ImbGden or Paul-of
both.
In 1916, the writer found in Richmond,
Madison Co., KY, several families of Es
tills, the descendants of the founder in
part of Waynesboro'. You have in your
town, as we believe, the descendants of
James Flack, in Abraham Lynn's and Mr..
A. S. Lara's families.
~- There were at least two very interesting
Revolutionary incidents in Waynesboro' s
Revolutionary Il story, we could have mel
toned, but didn't have the authority to do
SO correctly. The first from small vol
ume written by the late Judge FIR. Brooke,
the President of the old Court of Appeals,
and father of Robert S., identified with us
as the son-in-law first of Joseph and second
of his brother Abraham Smith. He wrote
it for his family, and mentioned crossing at
Howardsville Gap, en- route from 'Point of
Fork" (Columbia) to Staunton, soon after
1arleton's visit to Charlottesville. Gen'l
joseph Mcdowell, one of the heroes of
Kings Mountain, then commanded about
1,O06 men at Waynesboro'.
The other. was the very interesting
mention of the distinguished French engi-
neerss the Count De Castelleux, who, after
the surrender of Yorktown, with some of
his companions, spent night at Maj. Will
sons tavern, as we suppose, in Waynes-
boro', on their way to the Natural Bridge.
1t is graphic and amusing in the extreme.
OCCASIONAL.