USA > Georgia > Floyd County > Rome > A history of Rome and Floyd County, State of Georgia, United States of America; including numerous incidents of more than local interest, 1540-1922, Volume I > Part 77
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73 | Part 74 | Part 75 | Part 76 | Part 77
"'I leaped within, slamming the door with a loud noise behind, and at the same time with a sickening gasp ut- tering the name of my sweetheart.
"There, seated in front of a blazing, giowing hickory log fire, with candles burning brightly on the mantel and bureau. was the blushing bride, sur- rounded by the six lovely brides- maids.' "
TOO LATE TO BE CLASSIFIED.
On the eve of going to press, a good "story" has been received. Mrs. Mabel Washbourne Anderson, of Pryor, Okla., sends a book of poems by her father, the late John Rollin Ridge (son of John Ridge, grandson of Major Ridge and native of the present Floyd County), in which is contained a preface with a highly engrossing narrative by the poet, which carries the reader back to the Indian days at Rome .* This ac- count speaks for itself in the main. It needs explaining with respect to the location of the home of John Ridge. It leaves for the reader to figure out whether Mr. Ridge lived in Ridge Val- ley (at "Hermitage") or at the old Hume place about two miles north of North Rome, on the Southern railway.
John Rollin Ridge mentions his father's house "on a high hill, with a large spring at the foot of it," and another nearby hill, 200 yards away. The Rush place is on an elevation, at the foot of which, in Ridge Valley, is a
bold spring. The Hume place is mostly flat, and its spring is probably smaller than the other spring.
But to the article by the poet. It is contained in a book called "Poems," published in 1868 by Henry Payot & Co., and printed by Edward Bosqui & Co., at 517 Clay St., San Francisco, Cal. The book has been out of print so many years that copies of it are rare. The publisher's prefatory note pre- cedes the Ridge account, and both now follow :
"Most of the poems in this little vol- ume are the productions of boyhood; very few of them were written after the author had reached the age of 20 .- As his career on the coast, in connec- tion with political and literary jour- nalism, is familiar to all readers, we will add nothing to this letter.
"'I was born in the Cherokee Na- tion, east of the Mississippi River, on the 19th of Mar., 1827 .** My earliest recollections are of such things as are pleasing to childhood, the fondness of a kind father, and the smiles of an affectionate mother. My father, the late John Ridge, as you know, was one of the chiefs of the tribe, and son of the warrior and orator distinguished in Cherokee councils and battles, who was known among the whites as Major Ridge, and amongst his own people as Ka-nun-ta-cla-ge. My father grew up until he was twelve or fifteen years of age, as any untutored Indian, and he used well to remember the time when his greatest delight was to strip him- self of his Indian costume, and with aboriginal cane-gig in hand, while away the long summer days in wading up and down creeks in search of craw- fish.
"'At the age which I have men- tioned before, a missionary station sprang into existence, and Major Ridge sent his son John, who could not speak a word of English, to school at this station, placing him under the instruction of a venerable missionary named Gambol .*** Here he learned
*Undoubtedly at Running Waters.
** John Rollin Ridge died in 1867 at Grass Valley, Cal., and was there buried under a stunted tree which he had planted years before while engaged in placer mining. His wife died about 1910 at Berkeley, Cal., and was laid to rest at that place, which is the site of the University of California. Mrs. Ridge got to- gether the choicest of her husband's poems and had them published a year after his death. Among his best serious efforts are "Mt. Shasta" and "The Atlantic Cable." He was often called upon to read his verses at public meet- ings and college commencements.
*** Supposed to have been at Spring Place.
639
MISCELLANEOUS-LAGNIAPPE
rapidly, and in the course of a year acquired a sufficient knowledge of the white man's language to speak it quite fluently.
"'Major Ridge had become fully impressed with the importance of civil- ization. He had built him a log cabin, in imitation of the border whites, and opened him a farm. The missionary, Gambol, told him of an institution built up in a distant land especially for the education of Indian youths (Cornwall, Conn.), and here he con- cluded to send his son. After hearing some stern advice from his father, with respect to the manner in which he should conduct himself among the "palefaces," John left for the Corn- wall school, in charge of a friendly missionary. He remained there until his education was completed. During his attendance at this institution, he fell in love with a young white girl of the place, daughter of Mr. Nor- thrup .*
" 'His love was reciprocated. He re- turned home to his father, gained his consent, though with much difficulty (for the old Major wished him to marry a chief's daughter amongst his own people), went back again to Corn- wall, and shortly brought his "pale- faced bride to the wild country of the Cherokees. In due course of time, I, John Rollin, came into the world.
1 was called by my grandfather "Chees-quat-a-law-ny," which, inter- preted, means "Yellow Bird." Thus you have a knowledge of my parent- age and how it happened that I am an Indian.
" 'Things had now changed with the Cherokees. They had a written Con- stitution and laws. They had legis- lative halls, houses and farms, courts and juries. The general mass, it is true, were ignorant, but happy under the administration of a few simple, just and wholesome laws. Major Ridge had become wealthy by trading with the whites and by prudent man- agement. He had built him an ele- gant house on the banks of the "Oos- te-nar-ly River," on which now stands the thriving town of Rome, Ga.
"'Many a time in my buoyant boy- hood have I strayed along its summer- shaded shores and glided in a light canoe over its swiftly-rolling bosom, and beneath its ever-hanging willows. Alas for the beautiful scene! The Indian's form haunts it no more!
"'My father's residence was a few miles east of the "Oostenar-ly." I re-
member it well,-a large two-story house, on a high hill, crowned with a fine grove of oak and hickory, a large clear spring at the foot of the hill, and an extensive farm stretching away down into the valley, with a fine or- chard on the left. On another hill some 200 yards distant stood the school house, built at my father's expense, for the use of a missionary, Miss Sophie Sawyer, who made her. home with our family and taught my father's children and all who chose to come for her instruction. I went to this school until I was ten years of age-which was in 1837. Then another change had come over the Cherokee Nation. A demon spell had fallen upon it. The white man had become covetous of the soil. The unhappy Indian was driven from his house,-not one, but thous- ands-and the white man's plough- share turned up the acres which he had called his own. Wherever the Indian built his cabin and planted his corn, there was the spot which the white man craved. Convicted on suspicion, they were sentenced to death by laws whose authority they could not ac- knowledge, and hanged on the white man's gallows. Oppression became in- tolerable, and forced by extreme ne- cessity, they at last gave up their homes, yielded their beloved country to the rapacity of the Georgians, and wended their way in silence and sor- row to the forests of the far west. In 1837 my father moved his family to his new home. He built his houses and opened his farm; gave encouragement to the rising neighborhood and fed many a naked and hungry Indian whom oppression had prostrated to the dust.
"""'A second time he built a school- house, and Miss Sawyer again in- structed his own children and the chil- dren of his neighbors. Two years rolled away in quietude, but the spring of '39 brought in a terrible train of events. Parties had arisen in the Na- tion. The removal west had fomented discontents of the darkest and dead- liest nature. The ignorant Indians, unable to vent their rage on the whites, turned their wrath toward their own chiefs, and chose to hold them re- sponsible for what had happened. John Ross made use of these prejudices to establish his own power. He held a secret council and plotted the death of my father and grandfather, and Boudinot and others who were friendly to the interests of these men. John Ridge was at this time the most pow- erful man in the Nation, and it was
*Sarah Bird Northrup.
640
A HISTORY OF ROME AND FLOYD COUNTY
necessary for Ross, in order to realize his ambitious scheme for ruling the whole Nation, not only to put the Ridges out of the way, but those who most prominently supported them, lest they might cause trouble afterwards .*
"'These bloody deeds were perpe- trated under circumstances of peculiar aggravation. On the morning of the 22nd of June, 1839, about daybreak, our family was aroused from sleep by a violent noise. The doors were broken down and the house was full of armed men. I saw my father in the hands of assassins. He endeavored to speak to them, but they shouted and drowned his voice, for they were instructed not to listen to him for a moment, for fear they would be persuaded not to kill him. They dragged him into the yard and prepared to murder him. Two men held him by the arms, and others by the body, while another stabbed him deliberately with a dirk 29 times. My mother rushed out to the door, but they pushed her back with their guns into the house, and prevented her egress until their act was finished. My father fell to the earth, but did not immediately expire. My mother ran out to him. He raised himself on his elbow and tried to speak, but the blood flowed into his mouth and prevented him. In a few moments more he died, without speaking that last word which he wished to say.
" 'Then succeeded a scene of agony the sight of which might make one re- gret that the human race had ever been created. It has darkened my mind with an eternal shadow. In a room "rerared for the purpose lay pale in death the man whose voice had been listened to with awe and admiration in the councils of his Nation, and whose fame had passed to the remotest of the United States, the blood oozing through his winding sheet and falling drop by drop on the floor. By his side sat my mother, with hands clasped and in speechless agony-she who had given him her heart in the days of her youth and beauty, left the home of her parents and followed the husband of her choice to a wild and distant land. And bending over him was his own afflicted mother, with her long, white hair flung loose over her shoul- ders and bosom, crying to the Great Spirit to sustain her in that dreadful hour. And in addition to all these, the wife, the mother and the little children, who scarcely knew their loss, were the dark faces of those who had been the murdered man's friends, and possibly some who had been privy to the assas-
sination, who had come to smile over the scene.
" 'There was yet another blow to be dealt. Major Ridge had started on a journey the day before to Van Buren, a town on the Arkansas River, in Ar- kansas. He was traveling down what was called the Line Road, in the di- rection of Evansville. A runner was sent with all possible speed to inform him of what had happened. The run- ner returned with the news that Major Ridge himself was killed. It is use- less to lengthen description. It would fall short, far short, of the theme .**
''These events happened when 1 was twelve years old. Great excite- ment existed in the Nation, and my mother, thinking her children unsafe in the country of their father's mur- derers, and unwilling to remain longer where all that she saw reminded her of her dreadful bereavement, removed to the state of Arkansas and settled in the town of Fayetteville. In that place I went to school until I was 14 years of age, when my mother sent me to New England to finish my education. There it was that I became acquainted with you, and you know all about my history during my attendance at the Great Barrington School as well as I do myself. Owing to the rigor of the climate, my health failed me about the time I was ready to enter college, and I returned to my mother in Arkansas. Here I read Latin and Greek and pur- sued my studies with the Rev. Cephas Washbourne (who had formerly been a missionary in the Cherokee Nation) till the summer of 1845, when the dif- ficulties which had existed in the Na- tion ever since my father's death, more or less, had drawn to a crisis.'
" 'Thus have I briefly and hurriedly complied with your request and given you a sketch of my life. I shall not return to the Nation now until cir- cumstances are materially changed. I shall cast my fortunes for some time with the whites. I am 23 years old, married and have an infant daugh- ter. I will still devote my life to my people, though not amongst them, and before I die I hope to see the Chero- kee Nation, in conjunction with the Choctaws, admitted into the Confed- eracy of the United States.'"
*Elias Boudinot, it will be remembered, was killed at the same time by the same assassins. ** The reader should bear in mind that Ross disclaimed any personal responsibility in the plot and its execution, and that the culprits were never apprehended. The new Indian country was not amenable to such laws at that time as would cause a strict reckoning to be had in the circumstances.
TH.
12'F
THI
H
III K IRY
NGKIS THE
UGRESS TI
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS
0 014 496 944 3
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.