The Somerset herald. [volume] (Somerset, Pa.) 1870-1936, 1886-08-04
A o OF THE WAR.
An EXTRAORDINARY INCIDENT OF WOMAN ;
IN THE FOUNTAINS OF
NORTH CARnllNA.

NORTH cAholdNA.
The "poor whites" of the South are
generally very "low down in the scale
of humanity. The most Of them come
from very poor stock, the OF the
London jails who were sold TO Virginia
planters TO pay their passage across the
ocean. Being too lazy or too shiftless TO
get a living for themselves III a civilized
community, they were, when their term
of service had expired, driven from the
seaboard to the back country, where they
herded with horse thieves and other
criminals who had fled from justice, and
could find safety only on the frontier.
their progeny has partaken of the traits
of both-laziness and r~ascality. They
have the shiftlessness Of the pauper and
the cunning Of the thief But they are
not ali possessed Of these characteristics,
and one of the exceptions was a woman
named Nancy Hawkins, whom ! met
amongt the mountains Of Madison county,
in North Carolina.
She WAS a remarkable person, and any
where. in any sphere, would have exert
ed a wide and strong influence upon the
community. Born and raised in a local
ity 50 vile that il had acquired the apPro-
pirate name of Sodom, il wa said that
she had not escaped the universal deg
radiation but this | could not believe
when looked into her clear spiritual
eyes, that told of a pure lofty soul, that
might be touched but could o be con
taminated by the ~Vileness around her.
She was then moi far from sixty years
of age, and time mad traced deep lines
about her mouth and streaked with gray
her once chestnut brown hair; but still
there was grace and yigor in her every
movement. and a glance in her eye which
showed that her spirit had not yet grown
old OF been broken by deep affection.
Those who had known her in her youth
told me that she was very beautiful, and
/ could easily believe it, for she was so
still, though now her beauty was noi of
form or feature, but of the soul, which in
repose looked through her ewes with a
dreamy, far away gaze, but when anlma-
ted by some thrilling recollection would
suddenly blaze forth with a sort of heroic
fire.
And yet this woman was clad in home
spun and tenanted a rude log cabin on
the slope of II sterile mountain. The
general disorder of the three rooms which
composed her home gave me no very ex-
allied opinion of her housekeeping quail
ties, but | forgot this when she stood in
the doorway, and, pointing 10 a heap of
charred iogs near by, said:
Thar, sir, Is whar ! buried my boys,
on the spot whar they hell, the ruins of
our old home for thar monument and
down thar. sir. by that spring, is whar
twenty rebels paid for that days doin's."
Then she seated herself 10y the fire. and
! heard from her lip the story of her
life, which. had She lived in more heroic
age, would have ere long gone into the
annals of a nation.
At the outbreak Of the rebellion she
was a widow with three sons, the Young
est Of whom was a boy Of but sixteen.
Being able TO read. she could judge intel
l-.,tl- 20 a.. n..,,. e .ln a.oa:.,
which in this section arrayed neighbor
against neighbor. and made a mans foes
those of his own household. With all
the ardor of an intense nature she rever-
enced the old Gag, and she said now to
her SONS: - wish / was a man that |
might shoulder a musket, but you, my
boys. you can fight. and if need be, die
for your country
They could. indeed, hut not then; for
there WAS no organized Union sentiment
in that region. and many long miles of
armed rebellion, which it was impossible
to penetrate, separated them from the
Union armies. 10 il was for months,
when the boys stayed peacefully at home.
following their usual yocations. Then
came the CONSUMPTION. and the three
Young men were enrolled 10 fight against
the Union. They came at night to saw
goodbye 20 their mother before leaving
10 join the southern army and then
awoke the spirit of this Spartan woman.
Fight she cried. and as she repeated
the words to me her great ewes blazed,
her thin form dilated. and her wrinkled
features assumed a look Of strange maies-
~. Fight agin yer country while thar
is woods We kin hide among ! would
rather see you dead-dead at my feet /,
tic-take yer guns-amd 90 90 the mount
ing. Thar's a God in Heaven, an He'll
see the right don't finally 90 under"
Taking their rifles and what powder
and lead wen in the house they went to
the mountain, where. night after night.
in storm and clear, in rain and snow. this
woman went 10 them with food and often
other fugitives. For she was bold and
o~utspoken, and soon through all the re-
gion around il was known how the Haw-
kins boys had eludsd the CONSUMPTION.
Thus il was not long before a score or
more OF stalwart mountaineers every one
ofthem handy with the rifle. had gotten
and been organized into a guerrilla band
by the elder son, who had inherited some
of his mothers spirit and genius. The
nearest secession force was forty miles
away, but on its outskirts they hung. strik-
ing blows by night and being beyond
pursuit by morning.
On their return from one of these ex-
petitions the boys found their mother
taken suddenly i'll, and, sending their
comrades TO the mountains, they remain
ed at home during the next day and into
the following night to wait for her rccov-
cry. Some enemy must have known
this, for in the dead Of night, when the
boys we've sound asleep, but fully clad
and with their arms beside them. the
mother heard a swaying in the bushes
about the house, something like the low
rustic of the wind among the trees. and
springing 10 her feet she cried: ~Up. my
boys: We are surrounded
Strongly barricsding the door. the