TO THE STATESMEN, SOLDIERS, AND CITIZENS OF GARRARD COUNTY. BY EUGENIA DUNLAP POTTS, MAY, 1874. CAMBRIDGE: Printed at the Riverside Press. 1876. The writer of the following little history has presumed to borrow the peculiar style of versification from Longfellow’s celebrated Song of Hiawatha. She has carefully examined the records within reach for the facts of her story. Should important omissions occur, it will be due to the meagerness of existing evidence. May events so dear to hearts now at r

Hear a song of ancient story, Of a city on a hillside, Of the valleys all about it, Of the forest and the wildwood, Of the deer that stalked within it, And the birds that flew above it, And the wolves and bears around it, Sole possessors and retainers Of the silent territory. Hear the song of its high mountains Of its gushing rills and streamlets, Of its leaping, rolling rivers, Of the meadows still and lonely, Of the groves all solitary, Of the land of cunning fables. Should you ask me of this

Of its gushing rills and streamlets, Of its leaping, rolling rivers, Of the meadows still and lonely, Of the groves all solitary, Of the land of cunning fables. Should you ask me of this city, With its legends and its stories, With its tales of peace and plenty, With its tales of Indian warfare, With its nights and days of watching, With the camp-fires all a-gleaming, And the white man’s deadly peril, I should answer, I should tell you, ’Tis the city of Lancaster, In the county we call Garrard,

The proud archives of the country, Shout his name in stirring pæans, Blazon forth his fame and glory, From the rising to the setting Of the sun he loved to follow. Many days and nights he wandered O’er the turf of good old Garrard, Now in sight, perchance in hearing, Of the birds and beasts and reptiles, Roaming wild and roaming lonely, In the groves of fair Lancaster. Now in sight, perchance in hearing Of the melancholy plover, Of the bluebird’s thrilling whistle, Of the redbird’s gentle chirpi

Logs without and logs within it, Building fashioned all so lowly, That ’twas deemed unfit to linger On its public, broad arena, In the center of the township. Down it fell one day thereafter, (In eighteen hundred and eleven, Of the ever moving cycle,) And a nobler and a better, Made of brick and stone and mortar, Reared its ghostly head among us, Reared its high and white cupola, With its bell and towering belfry, Clanging far and clanging nearer, Tolling loud and tolling softly, Ringing forth t

Ventured far from their dominion, From their rightful sphere of labor, From their proper place of warfare. When a public proclamation Called the people to the conflict, Called the brave and hardy people To unfurl the starry banner, Mighty men of valor rose up, At the cry, “To arms! To battle!” For the seaports of the Union Were blockaded by Great Britain, By our alien mother country, By the hostile British Islands. Many battles, hot and bloody, Many sieges and repulses, Many victories and losses

In the chapters now unfolded, Rare memorials await us; Of the principal achievements, And the men who made them famous, Some have floated down unto us, Some shall live forever with us. Borne along the stream of fortune, Carried downward through the driftwood, Come the names of learnéd statesmen, Come the lives of men of genius, Who were offsprings of the city, The young city on the hillside. Men who served the state and county, In the schools of jurisprudence, In the halls of Legislature, In the

Straggling history makes angles, Which do sharply turn my canto— Which transform my major canto Into strains of minor music. Yet the story must be perfect, Of the city on the hillside; Still the awkward miscellany Must awake my bard to chanting All the song of fair Lancaster. ’Twas in seventeen hundred eighty, That there came from old Virginia To the west, a gifted preacher, Lewis Craig, a Baptist preacher, Who became a valiant champion Of that church in Garrard county. Gilbert’s Creek, his chos

From eighteen four, to eighteen hundred Four and seventy, were statesmen Sent to represent Lancaster, In the senate of Kentucky. First, in eighteen four, James Thompson, Eighteen six, came William Bledsoe, Eighteen nine, was Thomas Buford, Then in eighteen twelve, John Faulkner, Eighteen thirty-two W. Owsley, Samuel Lusk, in four and thirty, In fifty-nine, George Denny, Senior. Samuel Lusk, in four and thirty, In fifty-nine, George Denny, Senior. In the House the hillside city Was in numbers rep

We have sung its days of pleasure ’Mid its households and its people; We have sung its days of profit In the gain of cents and dollars; Days of rustic simple manners, Days of industry and labor, Days of glory and of triumph, Days of pride and exultation. Now, there came a fatal era, When the busy hum of traffic Filled no more the stirring places; When the noisy roll of carriage Ceased to sound along the pavements, And the death cart’s slow procession Told of woe and desolation, Told of pestilenc

Herald forth their martial columns; Should, with powder and with flint-lock, Learn to battle and to conquer, Learn the tactics of the army. Brigade drills, battalion musters, And an annual encampment, Took in officers and soldiers, Men of strong and wiry muscle, Men from twenty-one and upwards, To the age of five and forty. ’Twas in eighteen twenty-seven That John Jennings was commander Of the élite Light Horse Company. Captain Travis Dodd succeeded, And along the years that follow, To the Sabin

From the entrance to the city. Thus was made the first partition, From the venerable mother, From the church within the suburbs, Called Republican and holy, Where the sects were wont to gather, In the willing, weekly worship. And the pastors and the preachers, Served the flock in health and sickness, Served the flock in death and marriage, Served them well in home and pulpit. And the doctors and the lawyers, All the households and the tradesmen, Still pursued their avocations, Still enjoyed thei

And within its classic chambers Have the children of the county Gone to school in many hundreds; Have in hundreds learned to grapple With the mysteries of science. Num’rous teachers have united In the duty of instructing, Teachers from the distant sections, Teachers from among our people. Music, English, French and Latin, Morals, manners, Calisthenics, Healthful sports and games and pastimes, Useful precepts, laws and lessons, All were taught within this building, Which the Odd Fellows erected I

Stars of fixed and cruel brightness, Stars of fitful gleam and shining. Stars of strange and faint illuming, Reads the national magician; Stripes of gory hue adorning, All the mammoth constellation; Stripes extending down the shadow Of the shifting, warning picture. What broad stream pursues its flowing, Through the fateful, dark camera? What bedews the starry emblem, With the startling shade of crimson? ’Tis, alas! the fearful shadow, Of contention and of vengeance; ’Tis the strife of human pas

Was laid out a modern city Of the dead among the grasses; Was enclosed a cemetery, On a green and graceful summit, At the city’s southeast section, On the street we call Crab Orchard. Shrubs and flowers lead the stranger To invade the sacred precinct, Clust’ring evergreens invite him To behold the sad environs. Gleaming shafts of purest marble, Greet the eye of friend and mourner, Costly slabs of stone and granite, Wearing strange device and fashion, Lie amid the urns and vases. Lie among the sh

Met in caucus and selected A foundation for their court-house: Chose a green and ample clearing Near the well-known Wallace cross-roads. Here alone in “God’s first temples,” Here with nature’s wild communing, Henry Clay, a youthful trav’ler Through the wilderness, surprised them; Found the little band assembled, Paused, and shared their noonday luncheon. Thus beheld Kentucky’s hero, The domain of future triumphs, Thus his eyes beheld the section, Destined soon to make him famous. And the pioneer

Edward Holmes, and Samuel Hogan, Samuel Kennedy, James Hogan, John Kincaid, and J——h Harris, James Mershon, and Philip Hogan, Moses Moore, and Samuel Jackman, William Nicholson, John Hidrick, Posey Price, and Stephen Letcher, William Poe, and Roland Letcher, Ennis Quinn, and Thomas Lankford, Andrew Reid, and Edward Lethal, Jacob Robinson, John Letcher, William Ward, and Luther Mayfield, C——s Smith, and R. McConnell, James Shackelford, James McGarvin, Robert Smith, and William Nelson, Z——h Smith,

The publication of the Song of Lancaster has been delayed eighteen months in order to obtain the names of the Garrard County Confederate soldiers. The author advertised extensively with this view, and one hundred and twenty-seven names have been procured. She hopes the list is complete....