USA > Vermont > Orange County > Bradford > Stories of old Bradford > Part 9
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His father had not joined them as usual in the family pew on that Sunday. On their return home, after Roswell, Junior, had courteously held open the door for his mother to enter, he had bounded away to find his father, to coax him away from the dull books and ledgers, and to hasten him toward the good Sunday dinner that the servant always had waiting for them when they returned from church.
He found his father in his study, walking the floor with a worried frown cutting into his usually pleasant forehead and his lips drawn to a tight, thin line. "Whv. what is it. Father? Are you ill?" the boy Roswell had asked.
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But the man Roswell had pushed him aside, as if he were still twelve instead of thirteen. "I've gone over all the ac- counts, my dear, it is worse than I feared. Much worse. I'm afraid we are ruined !"
For a long moment his mother had stood staring as if she did not understand or could not speak. The boy watched silently, hearing only the ticks of the big grandfather clock. Then perhaps Mrs. Farnham had remembered that she was the daughter of Captain David Bixby who had fought at the battles of Lexington and Bunker Hill and Stillwater. Her aristocratic little head had lifted proudly and she had put a warm, comforting, perfumed arm around her husband's sag- ging shoulders.
"Never mind, dear, Don't worry. We'll manage. You are the same Roswell Farnham whom I was proud to marry. We are still young and we have each other. We will pay our debts. Then we will just begin all over again."
Roswell the boy had not understood much more of the talk that had buzzed over his head during the next few months than had his younger sister Laura. He understood only that his father must not be disturbed, that his mother only half listened to his boyish prattle, and that his parents no longer had as much money as did the parents of his school chums.
Finally the day came when they closed the brown stone house, which was no longer theirs, and set out by stagecoach to begin a new life in the far-away hills of Vermont.
It was a long bumpy ride even in the new Concord coach which by 1828 had replaced the old springless coach of Roswell, Senior's boyhood. His father had said, also, that the narrow, rutty wagon road, which led most of the way through the woods, was a big improvement over the rough corduroy roads that had shaken the coaches to pieces and lamed the horses when he was a boy in his native New Hampshire.
Young Roswell had been much excited when they had started out. He had waved gav goodbyes to the friends who had risen early to see them off on the four o'clock stage. In this strange, wild part of the country to which the Farnhams
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were going perhaps he could have as exciting adventures as Grandfather Bixby had had. Why, when Grandfather had de- scribed the Battle of Bunker Hill, Roswell could actually see those red-coated British soldiers coming nearer and nearer up the hill, firing their muskets almost into Grandfather's face while the American farm boys waited, their fingers steady on their triggers, obeying Colonel Prescott's command, "Don't fire until you see the whites of their eyes, boys." After that Grandfather had gone to sea on a privateer and had come back with his share of the prize money. But on his· next voyage he had been captured by the British and taken to England where for seventeen long months he had lain in dark, smelly Dartmoor prison.
"Always be proud that you are an American, Ross !" Grandfather had once told the wide-eyed listening boy.
Up until now Roswell had always hoped lo be like Grand- father Bixby when he grew up.
When at last after two long days and a night of bumpy riding, the Farnhams had finally reached the quiet little valley of Bradford, huddled sleepily among the wooded hills, Roswell had been disappointed to find that there were no longer prowl- ing Indians and that the people no longer lived in log cabins, but rather in strong, sturdy farmhouses such as Roswell's father soon built near the Connecticut River for his own family.
It had been hard that first winter. The city boy had had to learn to get up by candlelight, to swallow his porridge quickly, and to go out into the snowy darkness to the barn where the sheep, horse, and cattle must be fed and watered even when the aching cold was so sharp that it hung in frosty drib- bles to the soft hairs about the horse's mouth while the water drained back into the wooden bucket the boy held in his numb hands and where the cows must be milked by the dim light of the whaleoil lantern.
Somehow during those long hard days of farmwork and nights of study by the light of the whaleoil lamp, the boy Roswell had grown up beyond the dreams of Indians and pi- rates and of war and ships. He had grown up as had his coun-
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try the United States of America, as had his State of Vermont to a respect for peace and progress, for order and hard work, and for responsibility.
The Old Academy (Founded 1820)
But to do the kind of work that Roswell had decided that he wanted to do as a man-to become a lawyer-he must go to college. And how was he going to manage that, Roswell wondered, as he swung his hoe. For college cost money-a great deal of money. His father had begun over again as his mother had said that he would, and he made a comfortable living for his family. But one did not save money quickly by farming, and already Roswell was a senior at Bradford Aca- demy.
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The boy decided to ask the advice of his principal. Per- haps the principal would know of some way that an ambitious boy could earn his way through college.
But Mr. Belcher had shaken his head. Then he had looked long into the proud boyish face with its eager hazel eyes afire with courage and ambition. "I know what we will do, son. If you and your friend John Fellows will promise to work very hard, I will teach you myself. Perhaps in two more years you and your father will be able to manage two years of college for you. You can continue in the meantime to help your father with the farm chores. If you study hard perhaps - I only say perhaps - you will be able to enter the third year of college instead of the first year."
The next two years were a long, hard grind. There was no time out for play or fun for Roswell's father needed the usual help with the farmwork, and the principal was a hard task- master who gave long lessons and expected them to be done perfectly. Night after night young Roswell, after a long hard day of work and study, forced himself to stay awake over his books until the early morning hours.
"If I don't make good and pass the examination to en- ter the junior year, I won't come back until I can," Roswell said to John .*
"What will you do?" his friend asked curiously. "We haven't any money."
"I don't know," replied Roswell, "but I shall get a job somewhere and work and study until I can pass it. I would be ashamed to come home and say that I had failed !"
"I think I shall do the same," John Quincy Adams Fel- lows, who had been named for a president of the United States, answered thoughtfully.
It was two years later and the two friends were on their way to college on the coach that went past Roswell's house on the cross roads to Piermont, over Saddleback, and onto the Barre stagecoach road. At last their dream of college was to come true.
* Direct quotation.
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During those two years of college Roswell studied hard, but he also dreamed of Ezekial Johnson's lovely fair-haired daughter Mary and as soon as he had graduated from college he spoke to her of his love.
"But the trouble is, Mary, I have accepted a teaching job way up in the wilds of lower Canada. The place is called Dunham. I can't ask you to share my life until I have some- thing to offer better and easier for you."
"Fiddlesticks !" Mary answered him with spirit. "Don't you remember that I, too, have the blood of pioneers and soldiers? I think it is wonderful that you have this position, Roswell, and I'd like nothing better than to accompany you. Now go and ask Father for my hand tonight, for I cannot brook delay."
So when young Farnham went to teach in what is now the province of Quebec in Canada, lovely Mary Johnson went with him as his wife.
After that young Farnham took charge of the Academical Institution in Franklin, Vermont. Then came the chance for the young man who had studied so hard at Bradford Aca- demy to return to it as its principal. Young Mrs. Farnham went there, too, to teach art. The Vermont House was used as a dormitory at that time, and Mr. and Mrs. Farnham were in charge of it.
After two years of teaching at Bradford Academy, Ros- well Farnham knew that the time had come to begin the life work of which he had dreamed as a boy, so the next year he passed the examinations that made him a lawyer. Not long afterward he became State's Attorney.
But the country grew increasingly restless with the spirit of war. The South fretted under the laws and ideas of the North. South Carolina seceeded from the Union. Four other states followed her lead within a month. The Crittenden Com- promise failed. Lincoln became president. Then the Confeder- ates fired upon Fort Sumter, and President Lincoln called for 75,000 volunteers. The Civil War that was fought to save the United States of America from breaking up into two separate countries had begun. It was a time to put home and dreams
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aside. Roswell Farnham became Second Lieutenant of the Bradford Guards and went with the first regiment of Vermont Volunteers to Fortress Monroe and Newport News in far away Virginia.
Colonel Farnham
After this first term of service was over Roswell Farn- ham re-enlisted in the Bradford Guards which the Governor of Vermont had made one of the companies in the 12th Ver- mont Volunteer Regiment. Mr. Farnham started out as a cap- tain of this company. Before they reached Brattleboro, Ver-
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mont, where they were to join the rest of the regiment, young Roswell had been singled out by his superior officers as a most promising and dependable young captain and was made lieu- tenant-colonel. For nearly half the term of his second service he was in command of the regiment, while his colonel was in command of the brigade.
When he had first started off to war, young Roswell had tried to say goodbye to his pretty young wife. But he had not reckoned with the gallant spirit of the Johnsons and the Rod- gers. Mary Elizabeth had no idea of being left behind. In vain her elders, fearing for her safety, tried to tell her to give up this "ridiculous idea" of going to war with her husband and to stay at home and wait as other young wives were doing. Roswell was going to the front of the battlefield. He would be in constant danger. It was no place for a woman, especially a young and beautiful woman like Mary Elizabeth. No woman from Bradford had ever gone to war with her husband before.
Mary Elizabeth shook her curls. "If Roswell is to be in danger, that is all the more reason why I should be with him. I want to share everything. Did I not promise, 'until death do us part'?" She threw back her head proudly; her blue eyes flashed. They knew that there was nothing more that they could do except to help her pack her saddle-bag and kiss her goodbye.
Mary Elizabeth was never sorry that she had taken the long trip south to be with her young husband. Always she was near to cheer and inspire him. When the bullets whistled about her head and when broken, bloody boys were brought to her moaning with pain and begging her to write a goodbye let- ter to Mom and Dad or to another girl like herself who waited worrying at home, Mary was glad that she was there. In her husband's most dangerous and exciting adventures Mary had her proud share.
After his second term of service, Colonel Farnham re- turned to his Bradford law office until the Republicans elected him to the State Senate. He was given other public honors and tasks, including three years as a member of the State Board of Education. But his happiest hours, he thought, had been
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those spent with his wife and children of whom there were now three.
Mr. Farnham thought of them now, of Charles who had been born in the Civil War and was now a youth of sixteen, of Florence* who had inherited her mother's talent in art, and of William Mills who had been the baby but was now eleven. He was proud of them all.
Mr. Farnham thought of the time when the new Congre- gational Church was being built. Daring young Charles had decided to climb the scaffold of the half-built tower. When his sister Florence had seen him above the clock she had been shocked and alarmed. She had run home to say, "Father, Charles is up on the church tower!" She had thought her father would be angry and scold Charles. But Mr. Farnham had gone to the church and called, "Come down, Charles .. Din- ner is ready !" Just as he had thought that message had brought young Charles safely down without frightening him. When he was home again, his father had told Charles never to climb the church tower again.
And now Mr. Farnham was Governor Farnham. With an effort the Governor brought his thoughts back from the past to the words of the speaker who was introducing him. The fire of youth flashed again in his hazel-blue eyes. The time had now come to speak to his Vermont friends.
* Mrs. Edward Osgood. Bradford artist, has had her pictures exhibited in many places.
TOMMY'S ADVENTURES WITH ADMIRAL CLARK
In the little triangular park below the library in Brad- ford, Vermont, there stands a bronze likeness of Bradford's most famous citizen, Rear Admiral Charles Edgar Clark, United States Navy. He was Captain of the Battleship Oregon and hero of the battle of Santiago. The winning of this battle was the final blow which ended the power of Spain in America. Our victory over Spain resulted in our becoming the guardian of Cuba and of the Philippine Islands, and in our adding the islands of Puerto Rico and Guam to our American possessions.
Have you ever walked close to the statue and looked into his face? This was what Tommy Briars, aged twelve, was do- ing. Tommy had been studying about the Spanish-American War in school that day and about the part this Bradford hero had played in it. Tommy's teacher had told the pupils not to forget to stop and take a good look at the statue on their way home from school. Tommy had run by it many times, but he had never looked at it closely before. He saw that it had a round, pleasant-looking face with a thick mustache. It was a kind face, the sort of face that would belong to a person who, no matter how great he became, wouldn't be too proud to stop to speak pleasantly to the most humble citizen, the smallest child. There was no cruelty or meanness in this face. Yet Tom- my saw that it was, as his teacher had told them, a strong, brave face, the face of a man who would accomplish whatever the dangers or difficulties. The statue's shoulders were broad and strong. He held his head in an erect, kingly way, as if he were in the habit of telling other men what to do and of be- ing obeyed. The way he was standing, Tommy thought, made him look like a man of action. It seemed to the boy that the bronze figure might at any moment step down from his pe- destal and turn into a live, flesh-and-blood man.
"You sure look like a brave guy," Tommy said to the sta- tue. "But that old tub you had for a ship wasn't much like the big fine battleship my brother was on in the last war. I bet you didn't know much about fighting way back in 1898."
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It had been light when Tommy had stopped to look at the statue. Now he noted with a start that it had become quite dark. He must hurry home. His mother would wonder where he was. But before he could move, a strange thing happened. Suddenly one bronze foot began to stir! Tommy's blood froze. Chills began to creep up and down his spine. He stared, fasci- nated at the moving foot. Now the other foot was moving!
Statue of Admiral Clark
The whole body started forward and crouched into the posi- tion of a man about to step down from a high stone. One bronze hand reached down and rested upon the pedestal. The hair on Tommy's neck was rising. There were goose pimples on his arms. Then the figure leaped lightly down. Tommy was too frightened to scream. His feet seemed to be glued to the ground. He knew he ought to run for his life, but he just
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couldn't move. The statue stood beside him now, tall, broad, and straight, every inch a soldier. Tommy cringed as one bronze arm reached for him. But the hand that fell on his head had a fatherly touch and the warm feel of flesh and blood.
"Don't be frightened, my boy," the statue said gently.
Tommy looked up into his face. It was a real live man's face into which he was gazing, and the eyes were warm and understanding.
"Come with me," he said softly, and Tommy knew he had to obey. Suddenly he wanted to obey. He wanted, more than anything else, to follow this man to the ends of the earth, to do things for him, to earn his respect and friendship.
A great roaring filled Tommy's ears-a shrieking and a moaning. A great blackness was all about him. Wind lifted his hair. Icy water stung his face. He felt himself tossed and tumbled, thrown this way and that. A steadying hand touched his shoulder. "Wake up, boy!" He opened his eyes, blinking in the dim light of an old-fashioned lantern. There was a great clanging of bells, scuffling of feet, the hoarse, rough shouts of men. He looked up dazedly into Captain Clark's face.
"Wake up, boy !" Captain Clark repeated. "This isn't any place to sleep in a blow-not until after you've gotten your sea legs. You'll be washed overboard !"
Tommy saw now that he was lying on the deck of a large ship, which had been tumbling him about as it pitched and tossed in the waves. .
"Admiral Clark!" he quavered, glad to see one familiar face.
"Captain, Sonny. I'm not an admiral yet, though I should like to be one some day. Hereafter, go below with your watch. Once overboard you're a gonner. It's seventy-five fathoms deep here." Then at the blank look on Tommy's face he translated, "That's about four hundred fifty feet-there are six feet to a fathom. So remember, go below with your watch."
"Now?" Tommy asked sleepily.
"Oh, no! Time for your watch on deck now."
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Tommy blinked. He couldn't see any clock or watch any- where, yet Captain Clark kept talking about a watch. "Watch ? You mean time ?"
"Well, sort of. Men on board ship work in four hour shifts day and night. A shift is called a 'watch'. Your watch now."
Tommy gazed across the wet deck at the ocean. He could not see much. It was pitch dark all around. The waves formed restless, deep, black furrows. They hissed and swashed all about them. As he stumbled to his feet and tried to walk across the plunging, slippery deck, which rose and fell beneath his unsure footsteps, he would have fallen flat, had not Captain Clark tucked a firm arm beneath his own.
"But it looks like the middle of the night !" he protested sleepily.
"Sure enough it is," the Captain answered good-naturedly, "but you've had all your beauty sleep for tonight. You're my cabin boy now. Remember? Four hours of sleep is enough for any sailor."
"Four hours!" Tommy thought longingly of his soft, warm bed at home, and of all the time he had sulked and pro- tested when his mother had coaxed him into it. He shivered in his wet clothes.
"There's always lots of work to be done on board a ship," the Captain was explaining, "especially on a battleship."
"Battleship !" Tommy pricked up his ears. He gazed up with awe at the great dark shapes of masts and smokestacks. "Jeepers ! What's the name of this tank? And where are we?"
"The Oregon. Two days off the coast of California. Sou'- west by Sou'."
"Jeepers ! Where we goin'?"
"Key West, South of Florida."
"How far's that?"
"About fourteen thousand miles by land measure."
"Fourteen thousand - Wowzy !"
A great booming roar swallowed his words. The ship roll- ed from side to side. He would have lost his balance and sprawled across the slippery deck had not the friendly arm held
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him tightly. The ship gave a sudden lurch, pitching headlong, hesitated, bounded up a wave mountain. Tommy lurched drunkenly forward, nearly colliding with a grinning sailor.
"Look at the landlubber !" Tommy heard him remark to another sailor. They laughed.
The Oregon
Courtesy of the Vermont Historical Society
Tommy flushed. Wise guy ! He'd show 'em! He tried to copy the gait of the other men, tried to fit his lengthening, bal- anced stride to the rolling floor. You had to spread your legs wide apart, it seemed. It was like riding horseback-you had to fit the motion of your body to the motion of a ship as you fitted it to the motion of a horse.
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"That's right Son," smiled the Captain. "You'll get your sea legs. I'm turning you over to the messman. He'll fit you out in sailor's togs from the slop chest. You're drenched from the spray. Look like you'd been dunked, you do! You'll live in the fo'castle, star side." He pointed toward the right side of the large cabin at the front of the ship. "Second mate's in charge of the men there. The more experienced men and some of the officers live in the lar or port side." He pointed to the left. "The boatswain, or bo'sun as the sailor lads call him, will teach you all the tricks you need to know. He's in charge of rigging, an- chors, and cables. You study hard and learn all about the boat from him. After you get used to ship's ways, maybe I can use you for my messenger boy. I'll need a good, trustworthy lad- one I can depend upon to get a message straight even if the ship's under fire."
He gave Tommy a sudden keen, searching glance that seemed to read his mind and soul and made the boy long to make good and qualify for the position of trust that would bring him into frequent contact with this great man. "Think you can lear the ropes ?"
"Yes, Sir. I'll try !" stammered Tommy.
"Now, Sailor, you'd better get into dry clothes. Then go to the galley," he pointed to the forecastle again, "and ask Cook to give you a bite to eat."
Tommy wasn't sorry to be dismissed. He was beginning to feel mighty queer. Everything about him suddenly looked uninteresting and sickish. He crawled into one of the boiler rooms and huddled miserably in a corner wondering if he looked like the sick dog he felt. The heat made him feel worse. He went up on deck into the fresh air again and clung to a ring in the wall to keep from being swept overboard.
The seasickness lasted for several davs. Tommy could hardly sit up. The sailors teased him, but they were kind and did his tasks so that he was excused from work. He ate little except for the salt beef and hard biscuits which the kindlv cook advised him were the best things to eat to prevent sea- sickness.
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As he began to feel better, he was given more work to do. Much of it was dirty and disagreeable like sweeping and clean- ing. Some of it was boring like learning how to make rope. He made bunks and cleaned out cabins. He ran many errands. He blacked and polished the officers' boots, sewed loose but- tons onto their pea-jackets. He was at the beck and call of every man on board. The officers were often cross and impa- tient. When the men were scolded by the officers they took out their anger on him. He seemed to be always making mis- takes. He was deathly afraid of the ocean, especially after the sailors had told him stories about companions who had been lost overboard and had their legs eaten off by sharks.
He tried to conquer his fear, to perform all of his tasks carefully and faithfully. He took the scoldings from the officers and the teasing from the sailors good-naturedly. He was a good sport about everything because he wanted so much to earn the reward of being the Captain's own trusted cabin boy.
He seldom saw Captain Clark now. It seemed that no or- dinary sailor dared approach so important a person as a cap- tain or even a first lieutenant or first mate. The captain was lord of a ship. Everyone on his ship had to obey him immedi- ately without question.
The first time the sailors, for a joke, made Tom climb up the mast to the first watchtower he had a bad moment of sick- ness, worse than all the seasickness he had experienced-for this was the sickness of fear. He clung dizzily to the mast and rail, knowing that if he slipped and fell into those green swirling waters it would be the end of him. But after that he went higher each day until he was no longer afraid.
"You know I never knew before that these old ships could go so fast," he said one day to one of the engineers who had just explained to him that the steam lines were controlled from a special manifold valve, located on the grating just above the fire room.
The engineer looked at him queerly. "You bet we can go fast ! Some difference between this modern battleship and one of them there old-fashioned sailboats. But everything on a modern ship has to be in working order all the time. She has to be inspected often, 'specially the b'ilers."
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