Putnam patriot., 1911-03-31
The SpiIliug of Captain Aliens Rum

Il
 produced. The large mansion house how occupied by George A. Reach was built by him in the forties. He was etorekeeper and landlord of the finest
 country tavern on the old Boston and
 Hartford turnpike. A distillery loca- led near the tavern furnished some of fhe liquid refreshment dealt out to the fhirsty traveller, but by far the larger
 hart of such goods came from Medford or the West Indies.
 Captain Allen was in the habit of < having his goods come to Putnam, his
 nearest railroad depot. In the sum. n1er of 1861 when the late John o. Fox
 was depot master, he employed as elerk a young man just out of his teens by the name of Alvin Burley of Wood kfock whose business 1t was to see that
 goods arriving at the freight depot were delivered to the proper persons. y# Captain Aliens groceries, store goods, .krum, etc., would often remain at the tjepot a week oI so before Allen would find out that they were there. No tel ephone furnished information in those <iavs. and some of the Putnam people < fnnnd out that they had only 10 repair 9to the depot with a gimlet with which .fo bore a small hole through the head of the rum barrels, and then with straw get a free drink on Captain Al- K len. As BurIey expressed himself to rne few weeks ago, It kept him half the time plugging up gimlet holes. 3 This state of affairs aroused the ire ' of some of the Putnam people, partie-
 rlarly so that of Frank lyn NJ. Spra que, 1rincipal of the Putnam High school, IN ho questioned Burley as to the road oyer which Aliens team went with sthe loads of rum, and requested him to z flraw plat of the road, indicating the houses along the line and a secluded sspot, and to notify him when the next load of rum left
 va A few days later Bur1ey carrying out the part assigned to him handed Sprague a plat of the road, and told < him that a load of eight barrels Of rum had just left and would probably reach d secluded section after dusk.
 M Sprague, with two young men, talk ing d team, drove some nine miles to t lonely stretch of road near the Bung
 Ree river, waited for Captain Aliens ieam of four oxen, driven by Black 5. Aaron, Aliens faithful man of all work, which came plodding along at a snail' gait long after dark.
 M One of the party took the nut of one sof the rear wheels, and it was then on- aiy question of few turns of the Wheel when it came off, letting the aXle drop to the ground Black Aaron x Seeing that he must have help and a
 Might, went to the house of Schuyler Titfany half mile distant for help, and when he returned found his whole load had been unloaded and the heads X knocked in and the rum spilled on the 4ground. The rum was of good strength Nor it killed every thing beside the road, young pine trees six or eight feet high Rere in two weeks as brown as though s41i re had run through them. One of *the barrels had in the excitement got into the brush and was overlooked. M Captain Allen was, to say the least, Somewhat vexed, and would have probably given half he was worth to 3have solved the problem of the spilling ksof his rum. He employed the best de- Electives of the day, but mum was the z @bass word, and for fifty years not one Df this quartette said rum to any one. & The stirring events of the civil war SbeXt engaged the attention of these Soung men, and Sprague and Burley sket about raising company Of men &dOr service, being mustered into Com Apany G, llth regiment, Sprague being f rsl lieutenant, and BurleY sergeant. < 1ieutenant Sprague saw service and ssBmelt powder on many battle field, {. Particularly so at Sharpsourg, Va. < lleutenant Sprague was promoted eaptain of Company c. Captain Epragues health failing him he re- .signed, entered Yale college, class of
 1S67, but the chills and fever which
 had followed him relentlessly from the South, forced him to leave college at 1he beginning of his senior year. Cap
 tain Sprague however managed to study law between shakes, was admit
 led 10 the Worcester county bar, and
 practieed law for several years in Wor- eester. While in that city he became Interested in religious work, and was ordained as Congregational minister.
 He preached for several years in Chelmsford, Mass, and at Springfield,
 later going to the Cong egati onal ehurch at Tampa, Florida. Captain kprague has lived stirring life, and added to his work as p"stor very ' careful study of socialism, which he Embodied in a book, Socialism from Genesis to Revelation" which has re- ceived high praise from the book crit ics of both A merica and England,
 M Captain Sprague has always been nagnetic and popular speaker. lie k bow living quietly al Tampa, Florida, ~ aud in a letter dated February 23d, he says, Yes, you may tell them the sto TN 50 far as 1 am conceraed. l have awsys been an enemy ot strong drink. fl is strange men will tolerate it.' @ Sergeant Burley lwas promoted to eecond lieutenant of Company D, and & then 10 first lieutenant of his old com Fpany C. Lieutenant Burley re enlist Ne egl as a veteran, and stayed with his
 fegiment all through, and was in com
 ll and of his company in that triumph march into Richmond, April U, loo3 M lieutenant Burley came of fighting & Block. He returned home in Deeem'
 be T, ls65 His home vas on the Nood- Rock side of Crystal Lake, and he mar Jed Minnie, daughter of John Stod
 dard, a well known Windham county Family, who lived on the Eastiord side 2 of Crystal. Lieutenant Bafley's an eestors lived for generations just over < 1he Woodstock line in the town oi nion, his grandfather and four broth ers all serving in the Continental army
 at one time from that town. His un- ele, Rinaldo Burley, was well known q aSsical scholar and anti slavery agl- tator, the friend of Garrison and Phil
 lips. Lieutenant Burley engaged in
 Business in Springfield, Mass and Is how resident of that city.
 3 Captain Allen conceived the idea
 that there was money to be made by Wt1 l.n kxl< xoda of