USA > Rhode Island > A history of Block Island : from its discovery, in 1514, to the present time, 1876 > Part 8
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Of the personal experiences on the Island during the Revolution we can gain but little knowledge besides what is traditional. A few incidents from the memories of bright, aged people here who remember distinctly how, when they were young, their parents told what they had seen. and heard, and experienced, are here given.
THE REFUGEES.
Deserters and criminals, during the Revolution, found Block Island to be a convenient refuge. Once here, as communication with the main was so much restricted, they were not easily detected by the officers of justice. They were desperate characters from both armies, but mostly from the American, or from some nest of tories. They
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were a scourge to the Island, unprincipled and cruel in their demands.
At a house a little east of Mr. Wm. P. Ball's residence, on his land where a beautiful spring is still flowing, and old quince and ornamental trees are yet standing, in the latter part of the war, one of those desperate refugees made his appearance. He was seen approaching at some distance by the watchful inmates, and the terrified hus- band, by the aid of his wife, took refuge up stairs in a large pile of flax, where, at the risk of smothering, he was quickly concealed. The intruder made many saucy demands, one of which was : " Where is your husband ?"" The woman answered sharply, "I hav'nt any !" She had divorced him five minutes previous. One or two more inquiries aroused her indignation above all fear. He then demanded of her a knowledge of what she had in that chest in the corner, and threatened to break it open, whereupon she defied him to touch it, and springing for her scissors, with the pointed blade made ready to stab, she made for him exclaiming, "Get out of this house, you infernal villain, or I'll kill you with these scissors !" Perhaps she was emboldened by Shakespeare's "quietus with a bodkin." The refugee considered retreat to be, in that case, the better part of valor, as no man can fight a woman.
The substance of the above was told to Mrs. Margaret Dodge, now eighty-six years old, by her mother who re- membered well the incidents of the Revolution as they occurred on the Island.
Mrs. John Sands, during the same period, while alone in her house, with her babe, saw a band of refugees coming to her door, and knowing their desperate charac- ter, laid down her babe, seized a gun and stood with it at the door ready to shoot the first that might attempt to enter and thus drove them away.
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THE REFUGEES.
They sometimes came from the main to the Island in sufficient force to row their light boats, called "Shaving Mills," with great rapidity, and thus they could capture a weaker craft, or escape one stronger. A galley with nine oarsmen, with such a boat, tradition says, came to the Island in a rough sea, for plunder. It approached the Old Harbor Point Landing, where the water has always been deep, and the rocks dangerous. The surf was dash- ing fearfully and the galley of refugees attempted to land, but were swamped and all drowned in the evening. It is said that while they were straining every muscle upon their oars, the Islanders on the beach heard a power- ful voice among them saying : "Pull ! boys, pull for your lives ! " followed by the cries-" Help ! help !" and for many years afterwards persons in that vicinity claimed to have heard the same command at night when no boat- men were there, and within the memory of the living, scores of men at a time have thus been deceived, and hence originated the "Harbor Boys," or ghosts of the Old Harbor Landing-ghosts of the struggling refugees rowing for the shore. The frightful call of the Harbor Boys died away about the time the Palatine ship of fire sailed off to return no more to Block Island. The ghosts of the Harbor Boys were a fit crew for a phantom ship of fire.
The despicable character of the refugees of the Revo- lution is seen in the following statement of Mrs. Raymond Dickens of what she used to hear her grandmother, wife of Thomas Dickens, relate.
The latter was a widow, and they came to her house and demanded her money. She told them she had none. They threatened to break open a chest to see. She opened it for them and let them see its contents. Satis- fied that she had no money, one seized her red silk hand- kerchief and carried it off. They seem to have been the
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offscouring of both armies and of the vilest inhabitants of the main-land.
While here at one time, in a tavern, they stacked their guns in a room opposite the bar-room in which they were drinking, while one John Mitchell was asleep-supposed to be drunk-in the room with the guns. Unbeknown to the refugees he took the best one of their guns and put it up the old-fashioned chimney, and continued to be drunk, apparently, until after their searching was over, and they had left. Then the gun came down chimney and did good service for the Islanders many years since the memory of Seneca Sprague whose father for a long time was its owner.
As a protection the Islanders kept a barrel of tar, or oil, on Harbor Hill (nearly back of the Beach House), and another on Beacon Hill, ready to be burned at night as a signal of approaching refugees. As soon as these were seen the shores of the Island were picketed, and doubtless in more than one instance the marauders got more than they came for. They generally came in the night.
THE WAR OF 1812.
During our last war with England, Block Island in the outset was proclaimed neutral. This proclamation was well known by the English commanders, and it was so constantly respected by them and their officers that the inhabitants can hardly be said to have suffered on their account. Indeed, in some respects, they were a pecuniary benefit, for their men-of-war, frequently anchored in the bay, were a home-market for cattle, sheep, poultry, and supplies in general, and for these an adequate sum of specie was promptly paid. Not a murmur of complaint against English plunder, like that of the French here in 1689-90, lingers upon the Island. It even makes one feel proud of his "mother country " to hear, sixty years
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after that war, so many speak of the honorable bearing of the British officers on Block Island and in its surrounding waters. It is true the officers and soldiers took things with which the owners were unwilling to part, but the invariable testimony is that an equivalent was always paid in gold or silver. Meanwhile, too, the Island was exempt from the taxes and service in the army to which those upon the main were subjected. They were at liberty also, as neutrals, to carry on trade with our own people in any of our ports, submitting, of course, to the inconvenience of being searched and examined in reference to English goods in their possession, and likewise of having their vessels hailed by the English ships.
Captain Thomas Rose, the father of Mrs. Margaret Dodge, while coming towards the harbor, from the fishing- grounds, was about to pass an English man-of-war of seventy-four guns, when suddenly he heard the report of a cannon and saw a ball skipping on the water before his bow. He at once tacked, sailed up to her frowning broad- side and there held this little dialogue : " Who are you?" "' Thomas Rose of Block Island." " What is your busi- ness ?" "I'm a fisherman." " What have you in your boat ?" "Necessaries for my family." "That's all-go on and good luck to you," and he bore away homeward again thankful for the honors maintained in war.
One vessel of the enemy captured Nathaniel Dodge in a friendly way and resorted to various means to induce him to act as pilot for them in the Sound, but he evaded the service by feigning idiocy and insanity.
Commodore Hardy, of the British navy, during the War of 1812, anchored in the bay his seventy-four gun ship, and was so friendly with the Islanders as to give them a dinner-party aboard his vessel, and many accepted his invitation.
One principal object which the British vessels had in
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coming here was to obtain a supply of water. This they got mainly at Middle Pond, Chagum Pond, at the north end of the Island, and at Simmon's Pond, a small basin of fresh water then nearly in front of the harbor black- smith shop, but now filled up and nearly forgotten.
A few relics of that war are still remaining upon the Island, such as a book of valuable reading in the posses- sion of Mr. William Dodge, thrown overboard from an English vessel between Block Island and Watch Hill, while hastily clearing itself for action. It floated, and was picked up by Mr. Dodge's father. A few old-fash- ioned horse-pistols were left by the soldiers, and are now occasionally used by the boys for shooting rats.
Deacon Richard Steadman, an aged citizen, relates, in substance, the following incident of the War of 1812 : While a British man-of-war was lying near the Island several marines came ashore, went to the house (now owned and occupied by Mr. George Sheffield) of Mr. Ray Thomas Sands, and wanted to buy his pigs and tur- keys. He refused to sell them on any conditions. They threatened to take them nolens volens ; but he declared to them they should not have them. They told him if he said much more they would seize and carry him to Halifax ! He dared them to do it. They then marched him to the shore, took him aboard the frigate, and handed him over to the commander, whereupon he was asked what he had to say for himself, and he replied : " Give me a bottle of liquor, and good keeping, for I am a neutral Block Islander." His demand was complied with for two or three days with good nature, and then he was returned to the shore and to his family.
Mr. Samuel Ball remembers the following incidents : His father, in 1812, occupied the house now owned and occupied by the said Samuel. Then, during the war, two English vessels, the Poictiers, a seventy-four gun ship, and
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the Medstone, a war-sloop came to Block Island, and the commanders and their officers came ashore. While view- ing the land they stopped at Mr. Ball's and called for dinner, courteously. The present Mr. Samuel Ball, then a little boy, went into the yard and picked them some flowers. His father, Samuel Ball, Sen., superintended dinner preparations, but the one commander and his offi- cers so much outranked the other and his officers that two tables had to be set, and in different rooms, and the two parties did not converse with each other. One of the commanders was probably a man of great distinction.
Mr. Ball also says that the Island boys caught many little pond turtles and sold them to the British who took them on board their vessels for amusement, trimming them up in red ribbons, and marching them about their decks. Not even one of these turtles was taken by the English without payment.
It is pleasant to hear the old people, without an excep- tion, now speak of the gentlemanly bearing of these British soldiers towards the men, women, and children of the Island in the War of 1812, and also to record the incidents, however simple, that commemorate such hu- mane behavior in times of hostility. "Small things dis- cover great," says Bacon, which agrees well with what Aristotle said long before : "The nature of every thing is best seen in its smallest portions."
The aged Benjamin Sprague, now in his 89th year, well remembers the following incidents of the War of 1812. The first of the British vessels that then came to Block Island appeared on the fishing-grounds at the southward of the Island, and there hove to near the fishermen. They took John Clark aboard to pilot them to the Middle Pond. About a dozen boats well-filled with fish weighed anchor and followed the English vessels, which signaled the fish- ing boats to keep at a proper distance, until the heavy
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THE HISTORY OF BLOCK ISLAND.
anchors were dropped opposite the Middle Pond. Then, as said Benjamin Sprague's boat was nearest, the English signaled him to come up, but to the rest to stay back. His little pole masts then came alongside the man-of-war and a few heads looked down, and one said, " How do you sell your fish ?" "Twenty cents apiece," replied Mr. Sprague, and an order quickly came back for a num. ber. "Please pass us down a bunch of yarn to tie them up," said Mr. Sprague. It was quickly furnished, and the first fish sold to the English by the Islanders was soon on deck of the man-of-war. " Please pass your money down as soon as you get your fish," said Mr. Sprague. This was done until the boat was emptied, and a second one signaled to come up as Mr. Sprague went away, reporting to the one he met, and the rest of his craft, the price established. They all sold out, and returned home, with cash in hand, to their families.
During the War of 1812 the Island, in a measure, was subject to martial law. The inhabitants, as neutrals, were restrained by both American and English laws from favoring, in a hostile sense, either nation. Certain goods were contraband, and certain information might be fatal to the informant. The sale of rum to the English was punishable by them. Such sales were made, however, at considerable risk, and much profit. Mr. Sprague, the octogenarian, tells the following story: "I lived at the Harbor, and the English ships were by the Middle Pond. I said to my wife,-I am going to try my chances. So I got some chickens, ducks, beans, and a jug, and started for the ships. When I got down by the minister's lot, with my hands full, and things under my arms, all at once several English officers hove in sight on horseback, by George Sheffield's, with their bright gilded uniforms. My heart jumped right up into my throat, for I knew they would ask what I had in that jug, and they were
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soon up to me. They touched their hats, bowed, and halted. I nodded my head, for my hands were full. Said one, ' What have you to sell ?' I answered, 'ducks, chick- ens, and beans.' Said he, ' What's in that jug ?' I looked up in his face, and did not answer. He laughed, and said, 'I'll buy your ducks, chickens, and beans, and go on and let my steward have them, and let my men have a drink apiece, but don't let any of them get drunk." They went on and so did I. Now, said I, there's good sailing and I'll make a good voyage. So when I arrived at the Middle Pond the marines were on its east shore washing the ship's clothing. The steward paid me for my ducks, &c., and I told him about the rum, and he nodded assent. I then went near the marines, put up two fingers, and beckoned them to follow me. I went down by the bank, behind some willows, and two came. The rum was half water, and I sold each a pint for a dollar a pint ; after they went back, two more came, and so on until I sold all out to them at a dollar a pint. As it was then about noon they urged me to dine with them, and I did, and they had their English rum with their rations. They asked me to drink some, and I did. Then they asked me if I did not think their rum was better than mine. I told them yes, but did not tell them how much of mine was water."
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WRECKS AND WRECKING.
To those unacquainted with the origin of the name Block Island it might seem to have been derived from its position as a stumbling-block in the pathway of vessels, and from the multitude of them wrecked upon its shores. All the facts concerning them would fill a volume full of interest. The few here given may be taken as an index to many other wrecks not mentioned. The one to which we give the most attention has received more notoriety, perhaps, than all others, and yet but very little direct knowledge of it is attainable, and that knowledge is based only upon tradition, and that tradition has been the nucleus of so much speculation, poetic fancy, and superstition that the following is presented with some timidity, antici- pating as we do, quite opposite opinions from some things here said concerning
THE PALATINE.
This was the vessel whose supposed wreck upon Block Island Whittier has made the subject of a fine little poem entitled "The Palatine." That a vessel of this name was cast away upon this Island, or anchored here not long after its settlement, there is considerable circumstantial evidence. But this statement is contrary to the speculative theory that said vessel did not bear that name, but some other, the name Palatine originating from the Palatinates, or emigrants on her at the time she came ashore. But did ever a ship go to sea without a name ? Were sailors, as were the Islanders, ever known to call her by any name
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THE PALATINE.
except her own ? Were a vessel from Turkey, laden with Turkish emigrants, to be wrecked on any New England island, if her name were Palatine, would the inhabitants call her Turkey ? And that too simply because she was from that country, while they could read her name which she carried ? No, Palatine was the name of the vessel. This is not only reasonable, but is also in harmony with traditional fact. Mr. Raymond Dickens, now aged seven- ty-five years, hale, and of clear memory, born on the Island, said only a few days since that when he was a boy he frequently heard his grandfather, Thomas Dickens, at about the age of eighty, speak of the ship (not passen- gers) Palatine. These two had memories that carry us back to about 1736, and Simon Ray, one of the first set- tlers of the Island, was then living. He might have told Thomas Dickens about the Palatine, or others in the prime of life, from whom Thomas Dickens got the infor- mation that he gave to his grandson, Raymond Dickens, who now communicates the same to us. By these, and similar links of tradition, we are enabled to authenticate the beginning of the chain of facts here presented. There was, then, a vessel by the name of Palatine, that came, many years ago, to the shores of Block Island.
Poetic fiction has given to the public a very wrong view of this occurrence, and thus a wrong impression of the Islanders has been obtained. This criticism is not appli- cable to Mr. R. H. Dana's poem entitled the Buccaneer, for he had no reference in it to the Palatine.
It is due to Mr. J. G. Whittier to give here his own explanation concerning his poem:
"21st 10 mo. 1876.
" Dear Friend:
"In regard to the poem Palatine, I can only say that I did not intend to misrepresent the facts of history. I wrote it after receiving a letter from Mr. Hazard, of 10%
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HISTORY OF BLOCK ISLAND.
Rhode Island, from which I certainly inferred that the ship was pillaged by the Islanders. He mentioned that one of the crew to save himself clung to the boat of the wreckers, who cut his hand off with a sword. It is very possible that my correspondent followed the current tra- dition on the main-land.
" Mr. Hazard is a gentleman of character and veracity, and I have no doubt he gave the version of the story as he had heard it."
" Very Truly Thy Friend, JOHN G. WHITTIER."
Whittier's poem has these stanzas :
" The ship that a hundred years before, Freighted deep with its goodly store,
In the gales of the equinox went ashore.
" The eager Islanders one by one Counted the shots of her signal-gun,. And heard the crash as she drove right on.
" Into the teeth of death she sped ; (May God forgive the hands that fed The false lights over the Rocky Head ! )"
" O men and brothers ! What sights were there ! White upturned faces, hands stretched in prayer ! Where waves had pity, could ye not spare ?
Down swooped the wreckers like birds of prey, Tearing the heart of the ship away, And the dead had never a word to say.
" And there with a ghastly shimmer and shine, Over the rocks and the seething brine, They burned the wreck of the Palatine.
" In their cruel hearts as they homeward sped,
' The sea and the rocks are dumb,' they said,
' There'll be no reckoning with the dead.'"
All of this barbarous work is here charged upon a little population of as pure morals as ever adorned any part of Puritan New England. Let no one suppose that the poet
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THE PALATINE.
was aware of misrepresentation and injustice to the Islanders. He, like others, doubtless supposed that the piracy once common about Block Island was carried on by the inhabitants. But that was not the case. Pirates from abroad, near the beginning of the eighteenth cen- tury, infested the Island, and as they sallied forth from this point upon our own and foreign vessels they gave a reputation, probably, to the Island which in nowise belonged to the descendants of the Pilgrims.
See the account of the capture of pirates from Block Island, and recovery of their money, in the case of the Bradish pirates, Colonial Hist. of N. Y., Vol. IV, p. 512. Also the account of the pirate vessels Ranger and Fortune headed for Block Island when captured by the Greyhound, 1723, twenty-six of whose pirates were executed at New- port, on Gravelly Point, July 19, 1723 .- R. I. Col. Rec., Vol. IV, p. 329 and 331. As late as 1740, the Rhode Island General Assembly voted an appropriation of £13 13s. "for victuals and drink to the pirates at Block Island, and their guards ;" and from the fact of keeping pirates as prisoners on the Island, many abroad doubtless heard frequent mention of "Block Island pirates," without dis- tinguishing them from the native citizens of the Island. But in all of these cases the pirates were foreigners to the Island, lodging there only temporarily.
There is ample evidence of the strict laws of the Islanders, and of their rigid observance concerning wrecks, and of the voluntary humanity from them towards unfortunate sailors. It was probably according to the directions of the venerable Simon Ray, Chief War- den, as he was, and preacher of the gospel, or according to the wishes of his son, Simon Ray, Jr., that the deceased passengers of the Palatine were taken the long distance from Sandy Point to his house, and afterward buried in a pleasant spot near his dwelling, in a decent manner, an
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HISTORY OF BLOCK ISLAND.
example subsequently imitated within the memory of the oldest inhabitant now on the Island.
The tender feelings entertained here for the sailor is indicated by the town authorities in 1704. Then Capt. Edward Ball was Crown Officer on the Island. A sailor's body came ashore. Capt. Ball, by the authority of the Crown of England ordered Constable John Banning to summon a jury of inquest. After " solemn " examination their verdict was : "We find no wounds that occasioned his death, but we conclude that the water hath been his end, or cause of his death." People who do thus are not such as set false lights, and murder shipwrecked sailors.
So, in August 1755, about the supposed time of the wreck of the Palatine, the sloop Martha and Hannah, Capt. Wil- liam Griffin, from Halifax to New York, was stranded on Block Island, and the captain was drowned while the crew, four in number, came ashore. At once a coroner's jury was summoned, the corpse was viewed, testimony was taken, and all was done that the best of civilized society could require of the Islanders. They were not pirates, poetic fiction "to the contrary notwithstanding," any more than the rats of the old stone mill and the charac- ters of Cooper's Red Rover were realities belonging to Newport.
By request, Mr. Charles E. Perry, an Islander and a gentleman whose scholarship and extensive research con- cerning the Palatine entitle him to a high degree of con- fidence, has prepared the following :
" Memoranda of Facts and Traditions connected with THE PALATINE."
" She came ashore on Sandy Point, the northern extrem- ity of Block Island, striking on the hummuck, at that time a little peninsula connected with the Island by a nar-
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THE PALATINE.
row neck of land. As the tide rose she floated off, and was towed into Breach Cove, near the Point, by the Islanders in their boats. The passengers were all landed, except one woman who refused to leave the wreck, and most of them were carried to the house of Edward Sands (who built and lived in the house now owned by John Revoe Paine, Esq.), and Simon Ray who owned a large part of the " West Side," and lived in a house near the one now owned and occupied by Raymond Dickens, Esq., a part of the timbers of the former being used in build- ing the latter. Many of these passengers, weakened by starvation and disease, soon died and were buried on a little spot west of the house of Wm. P. Lewis, Esq., and their graves, without a fence, or a name, though of late too closely approached by the plowshare, still remind us of the ship Palatine.
"Some of the passengers, however, lived and left the Island, and one of them gave to the little daughter of Edward Sands, then twelve years old, a dress of India calico or chintz patches as the material was then called. This little girl was my grandmother's grandmother, and my grandmother has often heard her relate this incident. My grandmother's grandmother died in 1836 at the age of ninety-six, from which data (she being twelve years old when the ship came ashore), I conclude that she was wrecked about the year 1752.
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