The sea coast echo. [volume] (Bay Saint Louis, Miss.) 1892-current, 1912-02-03


was reached.
/ One morning at dawn, on the white
sand beach near the margin of the
| water the old chiefs son was found
murdered. For days great excitement
prevailed among the tribe, and the mur-
| derer could not be found. AS the
spring time melted into summer and the
days dropped by, Oyola became a
changed Indian. No more did he fish
OF hunt, or, with his tribe, gather clans
from beneath the blue waters of the bay.
His bright smile faded and he grew mo-
rose. For hours be would lounge be-
meath the oaks gazing vacantly out over
the sea and, at midnight, pace the lonely
| shores, muttering wildly to himself.
At last he gave himself up and confessed
his crime-one just as common in these
days. He loved the beautiful Leedorie,
a young Indian maiden-the chiefs son
loved her, too. They quarreled about
her, and Oyola became murderer.
During the three days before death
he spent most of his time walking along
the shore, with poor sobbing Leedorie
clinging wildly to him, and there to-
gether they chose his resting place in
the heart of the forest.
At sunset on the last day they shot
him. AS he fell back dead, Leedorie,
with heart breaking cry, dashed for
ward and threw herself upon her dead
lover, plunging hunting knife deep
into her heart as she fell.
Thus ended the tragic love story of
Oyola and Leedorie, just at twilight
under the magnolias of what is now
Spring Park.
Leedorie was borne tenderly away by
her weeping relatives, while Oyola, with
his gun, bow and arrows, was covered
with red clay until high mound be-
came monument above his luckless
head.
The writer had often heard this sad
story, and one day started out with a
party of friends to search for the mound
containing Oyola. After long hunt
we found the great old curiosity. 1t
looked about fifteen feet high, and
about twenty in circumference, and was
composed of hard clay covered with a
green coating of grass, while, most Gu
rious of all, two stout cedar trees grew
upon the very top of the ancient struc
ture.
This was some ten years ago, and
wnen the writer, about three years ago,
once more visited the beautiful spot,
she was grieved and shocked to find the
old Indian mound completely destroyed,
only deep hole, with piles of red clay
about it, marking the once stately rest
ing place OF Oyola, the Choctaw.
On the low, broken banks of the bay,
near Dunbar's canning factory, its huge
limbs half buried in the white sands, its
gnarled and knotted roots torn from the
earth, lies noble oak, falling into de-
cay.
This dead monarch OF the shores was
hero in his day.
In the year of 1919, the bay was Wis
tied by tidal wave, that even sub
merged the highest points of land. Two
human beings, man and his young
wife, sought refuge from the flood in
the sturdy arms of this noble oak and
were the sole survivors of the most aw-
full storm ever known to visit our coast.
Up to the storm of 1893 this grand old
tree was pointed out as an object of in
terest to all visitors to the Bay, but, sad
to relate, the cruel elements in '93 con-
quered the grim old warrior of a century
ago, and now he lies prone upon the
ruined banks, where once he reigned a
prince of trees and was hero of the
tidal wave of 1919.
| Down below the high bluff in front of
Carroll avenue, in the days gone by, lay
a beautiful strip of land containing the
finest lot of oaks and cypress along the
coast. A long, low, Spanish like struc-
ture served as sort of inn to travellers,
and near this old house were two cafes,
some fisher huts, and over the water was
a sort of pier used as steamboat land
ing.
There was also wooden platform
| used as kind of market place.
This spot was one of the business CEN
tiers OF the village OF ShieldSboro, as
Bay St. Louis was then called.
1t was here that one Fourth of July
General Zachary Taylor, when on a
visit to his old friend and comrade-at-
arms, the writer's grandfather, was
asked to make a speech.
A great barbecue was given, and bon
fires lighted along the shores, in honor
Of the general, while the people came
from all the surrounding country to see
1.-THE great soldier of Mexican fame.
All wen. well until about the MIDDLE
OF the generals speech, when the old
platform collapsed and threw every one
into panic. That ended the festivi-
ties for the night. No one was seri-
ously Injured, but, it is said, the old
general, who was one Of those rough
diamonds. caused the atmosphere 70