St. Tammany farmer. [volume] (Covington, La.) 1874-current, 1890-04-12
ALMOST A TRAGEDY.
True Account Of the Secret Con.
clave's AWfullest Deed
Luke Sharp Confcsses for the First Tim<
the Circumstances Surrounding the
Mysterious SchoOl-HOuse Fire
rlaying = Trump Card.


now have to relate piece Of vilIainy
that not only set the whole village
afiame, literally rs we'll as figuratively,
but created a great excitement through
out the country, and was the foundation
of numerous sensational articles written
for the papers of those days. 1t may be
said that when the Independent Order
of Good Templars was started in our
village there were some villagers who
did not join. One of those was the tav-
ern-keeper. The lodge would not have
accepted him il he had proposed himself
for membership. unless he had consented
to knock in the head his barrels of beer
and whisky, and break his bottles Of
brandy and gin. This, Of course, he
had no intention Of doing, and he
had quite a number Of followers among
the old topers of the village. In fact,
those that joined the temperance lodge
were not those who needed TO, as the
membership was mainly composed OF
people who did not drink anyhow. Some
Of these were really earnest temperance
workers, and they believed thoroughly
that the keeping and the selling of
liquor was a great and enormous crime
that should be repressed by almost any
method that could be used. The great
bulk Of the lodge people. however, met
there merely for the social amusement
of the thing. to sing songs and to hear
speeches and things of that sort So the
Inauguration of the Temperance move
ment in our village had really the effect
of dividing it into two bitter factions,
the temperance people on the one side
and the anti-temperance people on the
other. The schOol-hOuse was the center
of the temperance movement and the
tavern was the center for those
who believed in personal lib
erty." as they called It. It was ru-
against the tavern-keeper for selling
liquor on Sunday and after the regular
hours. and it was rumOred on the other
hand that q terrible vengeance was to
be wrecked by the desperate liquor fac
tion against those whom they called
temperance fanatics.
With this state of things, of course,
We boys had nothing to do. We did not
understand the row, nor did we care to
know any thing about it but there
was one thing that We were wildly
anxious to learn, and that was the awful
secrets and pass words, and signs and
grips, of the new temperance order. IL
had been resolved that one Of our num-
Der should secrete himself in the school
house desk some night, which had sort
of cupboard under it, and thus learn the
secrets. But no one boy had ever the
courage to do this. We drew lots sew
eral times to see who should take the
perilous position, but, in spite Of urging.
the victim on whom the lot fell al
ways refused to undertake the task.
1t was believed by us boys that instant
and terrible death awaited the person
who disclosed the secrets of the order,
and l remember that we thought our
fathers and mothers would stand help
lessly aside while the masked heads
man of the order executed US in some
atrocious way. our parents being power
less to interfere, if they had wanted to,
which we thought doubtful. We pre-
sumed that they were SO infatuated with
the order that perhaps with their own
hands they would visit the merited
punishment on the spy who endeavOred
to solve the awful mysteries of the
lodge. II. however, dozen Of us could
have been secretcd in that desk to-
gether, l think we would have mus
tered up courage enough to have gone,
but as that was impossible the secrets
were not to be divulged in this par
ticular way. Every lodge night the
school mistress. who was a member Of
the order, tackled up against the
windows brown cloths SO that
nobody outside could see in. Then
there was supposed to he an out
side guard who sat on the steps
Of the school-house and challenged all
comers. He had regalia with . silver
sword on it. and on lodge nights he car
ried a real sword in his hand which was
terror to us boys. As l have said be-
fore. the school-house was situated on
an elevation of ground that overlooked
the big swamp. The front door OF the
school-house, which was in the north
end of the building. was level with the
ground, but the ground sloped back
ward and the other end of the school
house was up on tall upright timbers.
The rear end was SO high from the
ground that boy could walk upright
under the school-house, although he
would have to crawl on his hands and
knees If he came out at the front. Cn-
derneath the school house was the unre-
moved debris that had accumulated dur
ing the building. great quantities Of
shavings. pieces of timber and ends Of
pine boards. 1t showed peoples care
lessness that such an amount of in
hamnable matter should be allowed to
remain under building where children
congregate every day.
One summer night, when we all col
lected around the school house with The
object Of Srviusr q, ,,.,, int <hr A<-..