The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1901-03-15

zie and Annie Piummer, the Edwards
girls. as happy a quartette as ever
lived: Miss Rosa Martin, Miss Laura
Martin. Miss Martha Washington, Miss
Lalla Fittz, Misses Maria and Fannie
Switzerland and pretty little Kate
Switzerland. Miss Belle Bullock, Miss
Meta Swain. Miss Elizabeth Green, the
accomplished and beautiful daughters
OF Colonel Mason Virgins, and a hun
dred others, all beautiful and highly
educated and all richly attired n be-
jeweled.
And the men: Ben Wade. Tom Cook.
Jim Somerville, William White, John
Walter Montgomery. Horace Mayfield.
George Bellamy. Bill Aston, Phil Nor
wood, Ned Plummer, Austin Green,
Colonel Tom Jones. Peter Mitchell,
Blount Plummer. Elias Carr. Walter
Plummer. Ned Allen, Tom Skinner and
a host of others, all handsome and
chivalrous and most graceful dancers.
Well, bye and bye. the war came
along. Shocco and Jones Springs were
permanently closed. Warpenton Vas
deserted by these handsome men who
went to northern Virginia TO fight I'M
der Beauregard. Jackson and Lee, and
all these beautiful women quit dane
ing and went TO sewing and praying
for the handsome. brave soldiers whU
had left home and friends at the first
tap of the drum
a rich Roanoke river farmer who
had been made a confederate colonel
hired Old Frank Johnson'S band TO
make battle music for the boys wig
wore the gray and carried him and his
band to the front.
Old Frank was an aristocrat and d
democrat. but ne was not a fighter.
and he didn't like the music of the bull
lets. He threw up the sponge early in
the struggle and took his band back
to the banks of he Roanoke where he
occasionally played for a country
dance. Dances were not much in favor
during the dark days of the war, so
business vas dull, and bye and bye he
had to cOndescend to call figures for
'po' white trash"
After the war Did Frank Johnson
partially revived his band and played
for d few more picnics and balls, but
he was now too cid and times were too
much out of joint.
The last time l saw the old man and
his band was in the summer of 1866.
He played at Halifax, n. c., for an old
fashioned tournament in the morning
and for the coronation ball at night, and
this, by the way, was the last effort of
the old time aristOcracy of that section
to revive the ante-bellum festivities
and it was a dismal failure. Too many
of the old time aristocrats had gone to
the wall in the crash of '65. They made
a sickly showing at the Halifax tOurna-
ment. and the ''po' white rash" went
to the front. An ov~erseer's son caught
the most rings at the fitting and crown
ed the daughter of the county jailer,
| queen of love and beauty.
Old Frank Johnson died the next
year. and 1 have always had a lurking
suspicion that the Halifax tournament.
so disastrous to the ante-bellum aris-
tOcrocy, broke his a~ristocratic old heart
all to flinders.
Old Frank JohnsOn's band never play
ed classical music. don't reckon Old
Frank ever heard of classical music.
but his music suited me n 1 never
got tired listening to Katie Wells"
Gentle Fairy Belle" Who'll Take
Sugar In His Coffee" 'Mocking Bird
My Dark Virginia Bride" dc Folks
| At Home" etc.
Sousa's band with it's classical music
and marches are not a patching to Old
Frank JOhnson's band as l knew it and
heard it and owed it in those good old
days. now gone never to return.
By the way, 1 wonder what has be
| come of all those handsome young men
and beautiful women who used to dance
so gracefully to that sweet music:
AdlIy OIL tile IlSn IelI III DdllIe, SOlIe l.
early as Manassas, some at Seven
Pines. some at Cold Harbor, some or
the works at Petersburg and a number
of them in the Wilderness. but some
of them never fell in battle. Like Old
Frank Johnson. they loved fiddle music
and dancing better than they did the
bullet music and fighting. and they
followed the band back home And
those lovely women-nearly allare dead.
7 u 1~-f4 &Ia% 7 n -
cate a single oneof them. Such as arr
living l guess are mothers and grand,
mothers perhaps. but 1 will wager a
gill of buttermilk that never a one OF
the daughters was ever so beautiful as
were their mothers when I used to sec
them balancing all'' and swinging
corners" to the sweet music made by
Old Frank Johnson'S band.
The Messenger gladly publishes the
above article, sent us by the Hon. B
F. Grady as per his letter below.
Meesrs. Jackson & Bell:
1 enclose to you for publication
a clipping which a few of III
older ones have read with unusual in,
terest and pleasure, and which l thinl
hundreds of your readers would delighr
to read This account of old Franz
Johnson is deficient in hat it leaves GU
his career in the Cape Fear section, anl
we-my little company of readers-de
cided to ask you to get Colonel Waddel
or some other competent %racOnteur t.
supply the deficiency in a supplement
to Mr.. Woodson's account. My wifi
thinks, too, that old. Frank played il
Clinton after the date of his death a
here given.
Yours very truly,
B. F. GRADY.
Turkey, n. c., Feb. %. 1901.
At the suggestion of Hon. B. F
Grady the Hon a nj n has