The Mount Holly news. [volume] (Mount Holly, Burlington Co., N.J.) 1891-1942, 1893-04-04
A ROMANCE OF HISTORY.
An Incident of Mexican Cruelty on
the Texas Border.

An Incident of Mexican Cruelty on
the Texas Border.
A little restaurant overlooking the
San Antonio river. Two men with
chairs tilted back and feet against the
projecting rail of the balcony, were
smoking their evening cigarettes.
The dusk lay above them like bats
wing, ready to fall swiftly and sudden
ly, as it does in southern latitudes
Both were young and of goodly pres
ence. Western suns and winds had
tanned their cheeks and burned in the
red of youth to rich tropic hue
Across the brow of one-a brow
whose boyish contour moved women
with mother instincts to sudden long
ing to caress-lay loose waves of soft
yellow hair. Beneath looked out eyes
of dark gray, heavy with the long
thoughts of those early, desperate
days-days when republic worked
out in blood her long probation. The
other had fairer countenance, more
lightsome and full of happy promise.
No dark prophecy brooded in the
sunny shadows of the bright blue eyes,
and laughter sprang as lightly to the
lip as the blush to the cheek of maid.
Superadded tonight to his native
exuberance was some foreign element
Of joyousness, which seemed to master
spirit and muscles alike. He was full
of movement. Tossing away a half
finished cigarette, he clasped his hands
back of his curly head and broke the
silence with sudden speech.
Med, am too happy to smoke; I am
the happiest man in all this border
land. Nellie Herndon has promised
to be my wife. It's secret yet, but /
couldn't keep it from you any more
than could keep my love from her.
There is not another woman like her,
north, east, south or west. Did you
ever notice the gold of her hair? 1t Is
like sunshine spun into threads. When
ever l look at her ] think of some
quaint old words my mother used to
read out of book long years ago
when was boy back in my old
Georgia home. They went this way:
Whose shoes latchet l am not worthy
to unloose.' / suppose the preachers
would call that irreverent but God
will bear me witness there's no irrev-
erence in my heart when l think of
her.
At Harvey Armstrong; first words
the color was washed out of Ned Fos-
ter's face as with sponge, his very
eyes seemed to pale.
Bringing the chair to the ground,
~ l.. e.. 1. L. L L
leaned over the railing and looked
down into the sluggish waters of the
river flowing few feet below
How old and wise they looked, those
waters, in their calm, unfretted flow.
Good for you, old fellow he said,
as he extended his hand. MAY you
have centuries of happiness. If any
man deserves her it is you, Harvey"
This was in the summer of 1S41.
In the autumn of 1912, when Presi-
dent Houston ordered out Gen Somer-
veil to the Rio Grande to organize
troops and avenge the insulting raids
of Vasquez and Vol, Ned Foster was
among the first to respond to the call
for volunteers.
About one hundred and eighty miles
south of Saltillo, on the road to the
City of Mexico, is an old fort. known
in history as the Hacienda Salado
To this place, on the Goth of March.
1913. were brought the recaptured rem
nant of the unfortunate Mier expedi-
ton, that gallant band of three hun
bred and sixty men, the flower of
western militia, who went forth to do
battle for the honor of the young re-
public and were so treacherously
dealt with by the followers of Santa
Ana, to whom they surrendered as
history know how the terms of the
treaty were broken and the betrayed |
men shown no mercy but marched into
the interior, subjected to incredible
hardships, and finally imprisoned miles
away from home and friends
Feeling keenly the indignity of their
treatment, and fearing worse at the
hands of such perfdious foes, they |
overpowered the guard and escaped,
to be retaken ten days later and re-
turned to the same Enclosure whence
they had fed.
All this is history; but we have no
written record of that interval between |
the escape and the recapture, when the |
helpless, among the fastness of un-
familiar mountains; no record of those |
ten days and nights when the sun rose
and set but to mark another and dark
err experience in the calendar of human |
pain.
Ned Foster and Harvey Armstrong |
were among the number. Stronger
than the multiplied threads of the ca
BILE had grown the bond of friendship |
between these two men in the awful |
realism of danger and su ffering.
For four days the weary and footsore |
had Travelled down a deep canyon |
whose steep sides narrowed and mar
lowed until they closed and barred |
them in. Then the retracing of those
same steps.
few, sorely weakened, gave up the
struggle and dropped out of the ranks.
Some became deranged and, wander |
ing off, slipped down the rocky ravines |
and were killed.
On the evening of the tenth day they |
were met by a body of Mexican caval-
ry and hidden to halt and give up their
arms.
After three days rest, in which their
half-spent lives were restored by those
arts of healing the Mexicans know SO
well, they were carried, handcuffed in |
pairs, into Saltillo and thence to
Salado.
The hoary walls of the old hacienda
looked down in sinister strength as the
thinned ranks filed in. Eight Mexicans
were outside digging a trench. Ned
exchanged a look with Harvey, his
companion in irons, and whispered;
THAT means death" He was not
wrong. At two o'clock of the same
day the prisoners were ordered out and
ranged in double liSe against one of
the walls.
The officer in command then read |
the written decree of Santa Ana, pres
ident of Mexico, decree which pro-
nounced for these men fate so In
genious in its torture to mind and body
that 1t might have been conceived in
the subtle brain of Herod.
Every tenth man was to be killed,
the decision TO be made by lottery.
Into jar were to be dropped one
hundred and seventy Deans-one hum
1,ad a,d 6ffv.thraa vUhfta and nawsn-