Soldiers' record, 1868-07-11

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Devoted to the Interests oftlie Soldiers and Sailors oftlie late Wax*.
VOL 1. HARTFORD, CONN., JULY 11,1868. NO 1.
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.Prom the Tffeio York Weekly. '
FLOWERS FOB THE DEAD.
BY cor,. A. J . H. DUGANNB.
Flowers for t h e valiant dead
Who for t h e Union bled!
Let aU t h e summers shed
Sweets on our brave !
Let all t h e years renew
Liberty's colors true,
Plant the Eed, White and Blue
Over each grave!
Ked rose for valor sow—
Lillies for honor strew,
And for t h e hearts below
Violets blue,
So shall t h e years to be
Say to our children free
Liberty's colors three
Still are for you!
Lightly let flowers enfold
Pledges worth more than gold.
Lay on t h e lowly mould
Lily and rose.
Pledges t h a t freedom's seed
Planted at Runnymede,
Up out of thorn and weed
Evermore grows!
Out from these ashes mute,
Freedom's wide branches shoot—
Liberty's lofty f r u it
Beckons the slave;
Soon to these altars dumb.
Grandly, at beat of drum.
All t h e far lands shail come.
Blessing our brave!
Come, where t h e valiant host
Loving their country most.
I n her dread Pentecost
Yielded their souls!
Come, at the Whitsuntide,
Country, with love and pride,
Every t r u e man who died
Still on t h e rolls !
So, through the marching years.
Mustered by rosy biers,
Mingling their icianly tears,
Soldiers shall stand:
So, o'er each lowly grave,
Freedom's high flag shall wave,
Blessing the dead who gave
Life to t h e land !
THE PRESS-GANG.
MANY years ago, when I was a young
clergyman, ! became incumbent of a parish
on the coast. The living was but a petty
affair, when looked at from a pecuniary
point of view, and the duties were arduous
enough. There was no residence for the
vica's use; the lesser tithes were small in
amount, and not very regularly paid ; and
the parish consisted of a large, noisy sea-port,
full of dirt and vice. Under such
circumstances, it is not surprising that few
could he found who were willing to accept
so uninviting a post, and that the benefice
for some months "went a begging.
My friends shook their heads wnen I,
the Rev. Joseph Hawley, was gazetted to
the vicarage of St. Peter's, Sallyport. '
wa8 mad to ^ take such preferment, they
said. Within the memory of man, the
home. The morality of the seaports
especial, was lamentably low; there was a
frightful amount of drunkenness, and
there was not much more religion than
among some benighted tribes of savages.
During the first few months of my incum-bency,
I had an uphill fight to wage, but
I persevered, and I was thankful for the
results of my persistency. The people,
who first stared at me, or jeered me,
learned to respect their vicar, and, in
some cases at least, to listen to and to
like him. Sallyport was a town which
depended partly on its merchant shipping,
partly on that immoral trade of privateer
ing which the long struggle against Napo-leon
had fostered into a regular profession.
Accordingly, there were times when the
whole place rang with revelry, when the
fiddles played all night at the sign of the
Valiant Sailor, or the King George, and
when the exulting privateersmen would
fling gold and silver out of the public-house
windows, to be scrambled for by the
mob without.
There were also times when bad luck
prevailed, when all were poor and dejec-ted,
and when my parishioners were in
despair. I am glad to think thaj; I did
them some good. The good they did me
was probably in teaching me to entertain
mora hope and trust in human nature,
however debased' than I had poeviously
felt. They were a kindl7, generous race,
that amphibious population, in spite of all
their faults.
I had been a twelve month among them
and was tolerably popular, when the old
woman in whose house I lodged came one
evening to announce that " Mary Wade
wished to speak to me, if I pleased."
Mary Wade was shown into ray little
angular parlor, where, amid conch-shells,
stuffed parrots, ostrich-eggs, and dried
cuttle-fish, I was bnsy with my immature
sermon. "Good evening, Mary; what
can I do for Gracious! what is the
matter ?"
For Mary Wade, the instant Mrs. Sim-mons,
the landlady, had closed the door,
put the corner of her shawl to her eyes,
and began to weep and sob most bitterly,
but in a silent and suppressed fashion, as
if she feared to call attention to her grief.
"Dear me," said I, rising from my arm-chair,
" I am sorry to see you in such af-fliction,
poor girl. I hope your father is
not taken ill ?"
For I knew that the retired naval quar-termaster,
Mary's only surviving parent,
was very frail and old, and I could not
conjecture any more probable cause for her
agitation than the snapping of the slight
thread which bound that aged man to life.
Mary herself was a very pretty, dark-eyed
girl, of modest demeanor, the most regular
church-goer in the parish,and the quickest
aud neatest needle woman in Sally-
Imngof St- Peters had never been held port. The wildest youngster in town would
by a resident parson. Old Dr. Stall, that
comfortable prebendary and pluralist, had
pocketed the lesser tithes for forty years,
far away in his comfortable residence under
the shadow of Mossminster Cathedral,and
a starved curate had done the vrork. In
those days zealous clergymen weiQ much
more rare than at present. I was no better
than my compeers, nor do I wish to advance
any pretension to superior merit; butI^vas
one of those young members of the Church
militant who were piqued at the success
of Wesley and Whitfield, and grieved at
the practical heathenism of masses of oui
countrymen.
That was why 1 became vicar of St
Peter's. They had sore need of a spiritual
guide those poor inhabitants of Sallyport,
and no less need of a word of sound advice!
at critical moments in their reckless lives.
It was the war-time, und the time of the
great old war against France and the
formidable ruler of France, and Britain
step respectfully aside, as Mary Wade
passed along the pavement with her work-basket
and her calm, honest eyes, and
fierce termagants, whose tongues mauled
their neighbors cruelly, were forced to
own that old Wade had a pattern daughter,
and the best of nurses in his dotage.
" Oh ! no, sir ; heaven be thanked, fa-ther's
well; but I'm in great trouble, and
indeed, sir, you alone can help me.
"Be sure that if it be in my power to
serve you, the will shall not be lacking,"
said I, soothingly; though I had not the
slightest idea what could havo happened.
But I induced the girl to sit down and
compose herself a little, before continuing
her appeal for aid. Mary Wade sat down,
^vipod away the tears that stained her rosy
checks, and burst out with a gasp : "Oh
sir, it's about Henry."
I knew perfectly well who "Henry"
was, and i\\ what relation he stood to the
pretty weeping petitioner. Henry Mills
-too hard to have leisure for reforming at 1 with pleasure that he had been promised
a place as fourth officer on board an India-man,
and that on his return from his first
voyage I was to publish the bans of mar-riage
between Mary Wade, spinster and
himself. The young lover I had seen but
twice ; he had beeu chiefly absent on coast-ing
voyages ; for although the privateer
captains were eager to secure so first-rate
a hand for their vessels, young Mills had
always declined their offers. " Mary and
her father didn't like it," the lad had had
the mortal courage to reply to more than
one oily-tongued tempter, who told of
French and Spanish prizes, of rich ships
embayed among the sandy islets of the
West-Indies, and of sailors who had won
a sackfull of dollars by the flash of a cut-
Liss or the snapping of a pistol. Henry
Mills was naturally of an adventurous dis-position,
and I can well imagine that he
often looked with a sort of envy at the
departure of a gallant ship's company,
flushed with hope and confidence, on the
then favorite errand of plundering the
enemy. But old Wade, a very sober and
religious man, had scruples regarding this
rough and wanton trade, scruples which
his daughter shared, and which his in-tended
son-in-law respected.
So, when poor Mary Wade sobbed out
the words, "Oh! sir, it's about Henry;'"
was fairly puzzled.
"Henry!" said I ; "surely he is at sea,
and out of the Downs by this time; and
in a few months we shall hope to see him
come back from Calcutta to claim his wife.
The Clive was to have sailed a week
since."
"Ah, your reverence, but the Clive
didn't sail," sobbed Mary; "and now my
poor, dear Henry will be taken by the
press-gang, and sent off to the fleet and
sea, as so many of our poor lads have
been, and he will be killed in these horrid
wars. I shall never, never see him
more!"
And the girl wept more piteously than
ever, struggling the while to repress her
sobs, lest Mrs. Simmons should hear them,
and grow inquisitive; for my landlady,
though a good sort of woman, was an in-veterate
gossip, and publicity would be
fatal to the plan which Mary had already
formed in her head. A plan there was,
and no bad one, to be the device of a
young woman of nineteen, Avhose life had
hitherto been spent in the simplest domes-tic
duties. But before coming to this
notable scheme, which will develop itself
in due time, I must point out what was the
danger against which it was directed.—
Men were in great request at that time for
the royal navy. The bounty was high,
but the service, in those days of flogging
and discomfort, was by no means so at-tractive
as at present. It was on the
press-gang that the Admiralty chiefly
relied for manning the fleet, and at this
particular period the man-of-war tender
Grasper, commanded by Lieut. Barnes
lay in Sallyport harbor, and her crew were
busy on shore. As yet the Grasper's men
had made but few captures, of able seamen
at least, for the few sailors whom the
town still contained were hidden away
most carefully in artful places of conceal-ment,
and did not venture to stir abroad
until the pi'ess-gang should be gone. But
Mary Wade had just learned the fact that
Lieutenant Barnes had discovered the
hiding-place of a number of seamen, who
were stowed away in an obscure public-hou3e,
in one of the waterside suburbs
and that this preserve of human beings
was to be pouncod upon that very night.
"And Henry's there, sir," said the poor
girl, in a timid whisper—"he is there
along with the rest, and will be taken with
thfem. Oh! sir, it was .so unfortunate, the
delay about his going up to London to join
his ship. But the Clive proved to be in
want of some repairs in her rigging or
masts, or something, aiud is in dock ; and
the captain wrote word Henry need not
come up yet; and he was here when the
Grasper came into port, and was obliged
to hide like the other sailors, because
Lieutenant Bairnes—that cruel man—had
sent a party by land from Tidemouth to
intercept any poor fellows trying to escape
3y the road. And now they are all snared,
like birds in a net, and in a few hours
they'll all be in irons on board the king's
ship."
I was myself much alarmed by this an-nouncement.
I had long taken a good
deal of interest in this humble pair of lov-ers
; though I had but a slight acquaint-ance,
personally, with the young mariner,
1 still regretted much to hear that his
prospects of happiness should be thus nip-led
in the bud, and Mary's distress would
lave moved a more callous observer than
myself. I tried to comfort her, by sug-gesting
that Henry Mills would be released
on exhibiting his written proofs that he
filled the post of fourth officer in an India-man
; but Mary replied that this chance
was denied him ; he had no written ap-pointment
to show, nothing but the cap-tain's
letter, and Lieutenant Barnes—a
hard, overbearing man, detested by all the
seafaring population of that coast—would
laugh his expostulations to scorn.
" I heard, sir," said the girl, "that the
Lieutenant was specially anxious to get my
Henry into his clutches. He has got a
list, somehow, of most of the Sallyport
men, and he knows there's no sailor
among them all, except perhaps Minns
and Datchet, who are away to South-
America, to compare with my dear Henry,
and they do so want men to fight the
dreadful battles, and"— Here she broke
down altogether.
"But what can I do to assist in this
matter ?" asked I, in great perplexity, for
Mary kept sobbing out incoherent asseve-rations
that "1 alone—I alone could save
them both, if I pleased."
' "Of course I will do all I can," said I,
as I paced the room; "but I own I can
see no way out of this distressing affair.
I fear it would be of little use to speak to
the officer; he is a severe man, and not
very scrupulous, or report does him great
injustice. If I were to go to the place, and
give warning to the men concealed—"
"Ah! no, s i r ; it's too late for that,"
said the girl, shaking her head. "Before
I heard of what was to be done, which
came about through a neighbor's child
overhearing the talk of the men-of-war's
men, every way was beset and guarded.
I dared not go there. I don't even think
the i)00r lads know their danger, and, dear
si'-, they don't know they are sold "
"Sold!" I exclaimed.
"Yes, sir," answered Mary. "The
child I spoke of heard the tender's crew
boasting among themselves how they had
trapped the warist of the merchant sea-men
at last, and how the landlady of the
Blue Dolphin—to think any one should be
so base—liad betrayed tl;e poor men that
Avere hiding, to get fifteen guineas from
the Lieutenant."
This treachery did not much surprise
me, for I knew that the crimps, at whose
houses sailors were hidden until they could
safely go on board their ships, not unfre-.
quently gave secret information to ^lie
press-gang, when bribed sufficicnily. How-ever,
I again declared my readiness to do
all in my power, Avhile avowing that I
could suggest no resource in the dilemma.
Mary, however, was prepared with a
scheme, which at first seemed crude and
rash to me<, but which I willingly agreed
to essay, in default of any other plan.
"Thank you, sir, a thousand, thousand
times, whether you succeed or not in saving
riiy poor H o n r y . 1 will pray to God for
you to my dying day, dear Mr. Hawley."
So saying, Mary Wade dried her eyes,
wij.>ed away the glistening stuins of tear-drops
from her face, and tripjjcd demurely
from^ the room and down the passage,
wishing Mrs. Simmons a good-night as she
went by, in a quiet, clieerful tone, as if her
heart were not full to bursting of an agony
of hope aud fear.
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