The Montgomery advertiser., 1904-12-11
CHAPTER FIRST.

The incidents of the following nal rative. so far as they relate 'o
 early history of Montgomery nave II"
 CT before been published in iuii. the lack of documentary eVloence have derived them mainly lroih .no personal recollections of men, all no" dead and gone who were active par tpants in the stirring events or those early days Some of the incidents are still preserved in the memories or oe- scendants of some of the oldest tami- lies of Montgomery, the Thoringtons. Wymans, Washourns' biues anu others. ..
 was living in Montgomery in 1886 when the people rose in their might and drove out the gamblers; but as l was then little child only years of age, l. of course, was too young to have any personal knowledge of the dramatic scenes then enacted. | re- tain but one personal reminiscence Of these gamblers and desperadoes which I may as well relate here as a fitting prelude to the story have to tell. It Is just single gleam from what the poet calls the dewy dawn of memory that left q permanent impression.
 One evening after nightfall the Wy man family, consisting at that time Of father mother and three children, were seated on the front porch Of the old Wyman residence, recently torn down. which stood on the south side of Wash ington Street, not far from its june ton with Court Street. l cannot fix the exact date of this incident, but it must have been in the summer of 1855. when was about years old. The stiffness of the summer night was broken by sounds of revelry and riot. We heard loud shouting mingled with blasphemous oaths, and snatches of ri- bald song and laughter. Now and then there was a crash of broken glass. as If window panes were being smash ed. All the air was full of noise. My mother asked my father what was the meaning of the uproar. He said in reply, as I we'll remember, that the gamblers were having a champagne supper down on Court Street hard by. that the rattle of broken glass on the floor that we heard was caused by the gamblers striking off the necks of the champa gne bottles with. their heavy table knives. They were so eager to drink that they would not wait the te- dious process of drawing the corks.
 It may interest some of the readers Of The Advertiser to know the exact place where this revel rout was held. It was in the upper room of two story frame building that stood on the east side of South Court Street not far from the corner of Washington There were on the lower floor two apartments used as shops. The upper story was one long room over the shops with a stairway leading up from the street. I am able to give an ac- curate description of this old tene- ment, because 1t remained standing for many years after the gamblers were driven out. and was often pointed out to me afterwards as the place where
 
 summer night. It must have been a showy establishment. when it was first erected, with its broad windows and elaborate wooden pilasterS. I remem Der 1t in after years as presenting the shabby -genteel appearance of a store house that had seen it's best days and was fast going to decay. On one side stood the medical office of Dr. Slas Ames. leading physician, on the other side was the cake shop of Aunt Venus Hassell, free woman of color. Aunt Venus was a quadroon with com plexion so light and hair so black and straight and glossy that she might easily have been taken by strangers for white person of South European blood and lineage.
 There are few old men yet living in Montgomery who can well remem- Der these old shops. namely. Dr. John 1T. Henry, Squire James w. Powell. Ham. Washburne perhaps a few oth- CTS.
 In this long room over the shops, the gamblers were holding high carnival on that summer night in 1885. This place, however. was not a regular re- sort of these ferocious fellows of the blackleg fraternity. They had rented this upper room for this occasion only.
 It seems passing strange to me now. after the lapse of more than sixty years that this boisterous drunken revel is the only fact connected with the doings of these gamblers of which have any personal recollection: stranger still that I retain so vividly even this one fact. being at that time. as l have said, only years old But memory, as everybody knows from his own experience, sometimes plays fan tastic tricks that set at naught all the theories of the materialistic evolutions and physico- psychologists who would fain have us believe that mind is merely function of brain that for every exertiOn of nerve force there is corresponding exertion of mind force II follows of course from this doctrine. that, when the nerve energy, whose seat and centre is the brain, ceases in death, the mind energy ceases also. that mind and body perish together and nothing is left except the Buddhist's Nirvana, a state of nothingness
 l como now to the story proper of how the gamblers were driven out ne Montgomery in 1S36. On tho east sfde of Court Street. between Monroe Street and Dexter Avenue, just where Court Square begins to narrow into North Court Street there stood for many years a wooden tenement of two stories Tho mercantile establishment called The Fair" now occupies the very snot Of this building I am able to give an accurate description. because 1t re- mained standing for some twenty years after the happenings chronicled In this story. IL was built in 1892, named the Montgomery Exchange" and opened to the public with considerable flourish: for the Montgomery newspapers of that time made special mention of its open- ing on the Slst day of July, 1892, as If that were an event of great import ance. The Montgomery Exchange was long, low, two-stOry building, with one side standing sheer on the edge of the street and gable ends facing north and south. The first story front was the barroom with two broad doors of entrance from the street. The bar. where distilled damnation was dis pensed over the counter at 12 l-2 cents a drink was on the long side of the room facing the street A wooden avn ing supported by posts extended over the sidewalk along the whole front to shelter the loafers from sun and rain as they sat in their split bottomed chairs, and droned. and dozed and slept off fumes of whiskey. In the upper story over the ho rroOuo uara ba