The Republican journal. [volume] (Belfast, Me.) 1829-current, 1913-12-04
Chronicles of Prospect.

early days In the town of Prospect.
many of them of historical value and
now buried in our files. The following
sketches from the Bangor Daily News
are evidently from the pen of its bril-
liant aid versatile editor, Virgil D..
Eater, native of Prospect.
WHEN CAP'N ODOM HIT THE "NIGGER. ~
Memories of the Draft-Riots in Prospect
aud Their side Issues More Than Half
Century Ago.
Former Senator Eugene Hale, who
was then resident of Ellsworth, recalls
some memories of those long ago events.
such as crossing the ferry from Bucks
port to Prospect Ferry and hiring gray
and-red "Old Tom" from the stable of
Albert Hartman, the local grocer and
postmaster; and then riding away along
old Poverty Shore" and so up and down
hill over the toughest roads of Waldo
county to reach the "Mash" schoolhouse,
where the local town meetings were
usually held.
1t was four square and roomy edifice
for education, the best and biggest then
in town; here the school district meetings
We're held for the annual election of a
school agent; here the Rev. H. G. Car
ley, a Freewill Baptist clergyman.
preached every Sabbath without pay for
many years in succession; here, too, Dea-
con Edv ard kneeland, forcible and
pious old soul, together with his gifted
son and daughters, We're wont to sing
such stirring pennyroyal hymns as:
80, Happy Day That Fixed My
Choice,'' -"The Old Fashioned Bible, "
<'Coronation," Bangor. as well as
many standard hymns by Watts, Charles
Wesley, Addison. Bishop Heber and Top
lady.
1t was good singing. too-real old fash
Toned, campmeeting singing, for the
Northport Methodist campmeetiug was
in full-tide in those old days CT the Civil
War, when fighting and making love
went hand in hand with true love. and
When the Prospect, Stockton and Frank
tort girls were sweet and capable and as
good as YOUR own mother.
TO return to former Senator Hale, who
seems to have waited too long-the aged
statesman writes that he was on the
staff of former Governor Abner Coburn
of SkoWhegan, who after one term as
Governor made way for Governor Sam
uel Cony. who was war Democrat" -
Names Oldest ex-senator believes he
rode to Prospect ''to quel draft riot
in July, 1868, and that the historical
Odom De Silver feud was fought out to
d finish in front of the mountain or
KiIlman schoolhouse near the Frankfort
town line on election day in September,
1863.
Both Prospect and Frankfort were
strongly Democratic towns all through
the Civil War The late Marcelus
Emery, owner and editor of the old Ban
gor Democrat, was born il Frankfort,
and lis honest and out-spoken sympa-
thies were with the Breckenridge wing,
instead Of the Douglas wing of the ma
tiona4 Democracy, which made the cleo
ton Of Abraham Lincoln to the presi-
dency as certain in 1860 as the election
of Woodrow Wilson was in 1912.
The Odom-De Silver feud arose from
the natural dislike which most Maine
shipmasters and sea-faring men enter
tanned for all members of the colored
race Unlike the "Solid South of Civil
War days, who worked the negroes as
slaves, to be sure, but always protected
them from outside wrong, the Maine
Democrats and many Maine Republicans,
too, actually believed that God had Great
Tt tlle titRI " dCS W D0 a pei Pct0ol Noo-
sal to his white master.
On that day, more than quarter of a
century before the Australian ballot was
dreamed of in Maine, the September sun
was beaming warmly upon the killman
schoolhouse The usual town-meeting-
day crowd of dowr East men and boys
We're present-more than usual, because
Grant had just taken Nicksburg, open
ing the Mississippi from the Lakes to
the Gulf; and General Mead had fought
and won over General Lee at Gettysburg,
which was the decisive battle Of the
Civil War.
Those unsubdued - often famous -
''hunker' Democrats Of Prospect-some
then near one hundred years of age
had come from miles away, bravely re-
solved to be in at the death of human
slavery, though they had fondiy hoped
and prayed for the survival OF that Gin
stitution" for a time a. least.
The entirely unrecori ID memory Of an
aged codger WHO is Old enough to enter
INTO the kiaglom OF the. Beyond. recalls
III particular that the late River-Pilot
Jewett Hartman, with his handsome and
stout boys and his incompatible "soused
clans We're all there, and all busy.
Short diversions from a straight tale are
always pardonable. particularly in the
case Of the late Captain Jewett Harri-
man, whom everybody snow-or should
have known; because Jewett Hartman,
his boys and bis soused CLANS made a de-
iightful combination that was unique in
New England
The ale yed row was started by the
late Captain John Odom, famous fight
ans. old shipmaster, beginning to ''twit"
Michael De Silver, a mulatto resident of
Prospect Ferry, with being "neeger'
for so Captain Odom pronounced the
word, and haunting De Silver with his
colored ancestry, Captain Odom was then
tall and active man. nearly 80 years of
age, as naughty as true British aristo-
crat and as proud as peacock, while De
Silver was half his age, wise in Il e use
of his fists and physically very capable.
For minute after minute the Odom words
poured forth.
"Neeger, - "neeger," and again "nee.
GER" as if there was no erd to the abuse.
ALI the time Captain Odom was edging
in towards his colored opponent, and De
Silver was slowly backing away to avoid
trouble with an old man, it is presumed.
AS they drew closer together Captain
Odom with final "neeger'' reached for
the coored mans throat, which De Sill
yer Tended off with ease, but visibly net
tied, because he was led to exclaim:
THANK God, am not YOUR Niger,
whereupon rustic of sympathy for the