St. Tammany farmer. [volume] (Covington, La.) 1874-current, 1902-04-19
OLD "HOCK'S" STORY.
Bill Arp Writes About the Good Old
Englishman.
How He Sailed to America-Left His
Sweetheart and Shipped us a
StOwaway-Girl Joined Him
Soon Afterwards.

pennae" like that? But l am glad
made the mistake, for it has brought
me three letters and postal kindly
correcting me, and proves that thu
people who read the old-time authors
are not all dead. The last line of that
verse always reminds me of good ole
man, 4 comrade, Capt. John Hocken
hull, an Englishman by birth, and g
Georgia rebel who used to recite po
etry for us around the camp fires in
1862 and 1868. We called him cold
Hook" and everybody loved him, 70,
he was cockney and dropped the h'e
where he should not, and vice versa
There is always charm in broken Eng.
fish, and to murder the kings English
is no great offense. "Old Hook" knew
a good deal of Tom Moore and Burns
and Hood and Campbell, and it was a
treat to hear him say:
1.-THE 'eart that is tumble might 'ope for
1t ere"
He knew that other sweet ballad of
Anne Crawford:
'Kath Mavourneen, the gray dawn ia
| breaking,
The horn of the hunter is heard on the
hill"
And he always said 'TKe 'orn of the
'unter is card on the ill" The exile
of Erin" which he called the ''Hexile of
Herin," was another of his favorites.
Helearned these poems from his sweet
heart while he was an apprentice in
London-an orphan boy bound for
seven years to hard master, a brewer,
! and his daily service was to carry the
jars of malt from the cellar up fight
of stone steps to the floor above. He
never had kind word from his mas
ter, and one day he tripped and fell
and broke jar and was bitterly
abused for it, and told that he had for
feited the EGO that he was to get when
his term was out. He was then IS
and had yet three years to toll at his
hard, monotonous work. That night
he poured out his heart to the girl he
loved and declared he would run away
and go to America on the first sail
vessel that left the port. That he
would make some money here and send
it to her if she would promise to come
to him, and then they would marry
and be SO happy-and she promised.
Within week the opportunity came.
He told one of the sailors his sad story
and the sailor told the mate, and they
took him aboard by night and hid him
down in the hold of the vessel until
the good ship had Weighted anchor and
was far out to sea. "Old Hook" told it
all to us one cold night at Manassas,
and how sad and sweet was his last
kiss, his last embrace, his last good,
by. He choked up sometimes and the
tears glistened in his eyes, but it was
a pretty story, and Dickens could have
built upon it and made tender ro-
nance. This was away back in the
forties when our state was building
the Western & Atlantic railroad and
wanted laborers and had sent a man to
New York to hire immigrants as they
landed at Castle Garden. "Old Hook"
did not have to wait day, but was
hired and shipped to Atlanta and from
there to Altoona, where he did his first
work. He said he did not feel safe
upon the ocean voyage or in New York !
harbor, for he feared he might in some
way be caught as fugitive and taken
back, but when he got to Altoona and
saw the woods all around him and the |
high hills and deep ravines and mingled !
with good, kind-hearted men and wom-
en-, he felt safe and free. st never
knew wat freedom was before, and |
you Hammericans 'av no hidea wat a
blessing it is. The good woman were
I boarded and her daughter were so
kind and gentle to me that I would
'av rugged them if I dared. but I
thought all Of the time of the girl I
had left behind me and it nerved me
to good, 'onest work and the contract
Or soon raised my wages, and in six
months 'ad a 'undred dollars in bank
and got good man to send it to an
other good man in New York, and he
found the same captain I came hover
with and he took it to my sweetheart,
and she came back with him, and while
was every day looking for letter
she took me by surprise one morning
md just brought the letter with her,
md we just fell into beach hother's
larms-like-like-like major, hex
.use me now, I must go and look halter
ny 'oss." He had named his fine mare
Emma, so that he could call her Hem
ma, I reckon. But we made him fin
sh the story afterwards and tell how
ne good friend volunteered to go after
he license. and another after the
and his landlady and her
laughter baked some cake and got up
hextra supper and they were married
hat night at her 'ouse, and all he re-
MEMBERS about what the preacher said
vas: "Whom God 'ath Joined together,
ct no man put hasunder."
"Old Hook" was patriot. a good,
onest and true man. His neigh
ors at his home in Dawson county
II loved and honored him. and there
7as not man in his regiment (the
Eleventh Georgia) more beloved by
he men that he fed, for he was 8
hosen their commissary early in the
7ar, and you know it is so natural
o love those who feed you we'll.
Vhen rations were short he would
ravel all night to secure supplies
nd the boys knew that if "Old
lock- couldn't get what they want
d nobody could. But in course of
me the old man got sick and want
to go home. Other officers had 7
OF furloughs, but he had never ?
sked for one, He went to bed and e
ent for me, and told me he was F
ok and if he didn't get furlough
e believed he would get sicker and
erhaps die away from 'ome. I sus- $
ected that he was homesick, but he
'oked sick and I sent up his appli-
.tion. The army had been for