Tramp, Tramp, Tramp
The boys are marching
Cheer up comrades
They will come . . .

This Civil War song was skirling¹ around in my head when Mr. Marvin, the school master, rapped his pointer on the wall map of the United States. He barked in a gruff voice that shook me quickly from my reverie.

"Harvey Chadwick, you are day-dreaming; come to the front of the room and point out the Southern states that have ceded from the Union and show us where the Mason Dixon line is located."

I jumped up quickly and traced the Mason Dixon line and the states of the Confederacy. I didn't want to incur Mr. Marvin's wrath as I was in a hurry to get out of school and groom Molly, our sleek Morgan horse.

"Very good, Harvey. Be seated and be sure the wood box is filled for the rest of the week. This may serve to jog your inattentiveness. Tomorrow, we will study more about the Union Generals, Grant, Sherman and Sheridan. Next week², we will also discuss the Southern General Robert Lee and the President of the Confederacy, Jefferson Davis."

I would have been more attentative if I had realized that as a result of orders from Jefferson Davis, my father and I would face the possibility of being shot within the next few hours.

School was out but the chilling October drizzle dampened the momentary joy my sister Toot and I felt as we thought of the long walk back to the farm.

Then we spotted him. There was father with the buggy top up and Molly with brown feet prancing, impatiently telling us to hurry. We both had to smile as father said,

"Molly needed some exercise so I figured I'd give you two young tuns a lift."

Toot, christened Mary Ann, but it was too big a mouth-full for me when I was a two-year-old and she had kept the nickname, hopped into the buggy, gave father a hug and with twinkling brown eyes said,

"How lucky we are, Harve, to have the best mother, father and horse in the whole world."

"That's for sure, Toot," I retorted. "Father, you certainly are like a horse that will stand without hitching. You're always there when we need you."

Father laughed, shaking his brown beard,

"I've never been compared to a horse before, but I have got special young 'uns and a spirited mare that is just like them."

As Molly clip-clopped into our drive, father said,

"Harve, unharness Molly and hitch her in the shed out of this drizzle. Give her a good brushing and currying. Boy, for a twelve-year-old, you sure have knowing ways with horses. I guess it's that big grin, thatch of brown hair and smiling brown eyes that they like. Toot, you've got a knack with animals, too. Please fetch this note to your mother about the quilting bee at grandmother Royce's. I'm going down behind the barn and check the watering trough. It isn't as full as it should be."

The thing I like to do best in the whole world is brush and curry Molly and stroke her brown coat until it glows like Mother's best "go to meeting" velvet dress. Her black mane and tail shine as Mother keeps our parlor stove. Her soft, quivering nose nuzzled my neck and she began to do a little two-step to tease me.

"Molly stop that foolishness or I'll be here all night trying to make you real pretty. We were proud of you yesterday when Father and I drove you to market in St. Albans. You were stepping real high, wide and handsome." I was pleased to go with Father because I could hear all of the talk about the war. The Southerners are a rough bunch but General Grant is cutting their supply routes and getting them on the run. Thank God for a man like Abe Lincoln in the White House to hold the Union together. . . . We're mighty lucky to be up North away from the Mason and Dixon line. Those poor devils down there have had their homes burned, horses stolen and banks robbed. Father sure hit the nail on the head when we were in Bedard's hardware store,

"By Golden, Fred, we are routing those Southerners but we're paying an awful price to hold the Union together. When you think of all our boys wounded or dying and shot to Kingdom come, I don't know whether it's worth it or not."

A nice looking fellow with a haversack strapped over his right shoulder was looking at pistols in the store's arsenal. He turned to Father and said in a soft, serious voice,

"Well spoken, sir. Some of the finest young men in the North, as well as the South, have lost their lives. The sooner this hell can end, the better for the country."

I'd seen several young men with haversacks over their right shoulders in the bank and looking in store windows. I was thinking I'd like one of those haversacks, and how I would like to join the Union Army, but forgot all about it as we all began to sing on the way home, "Hang Jeff Davis to a sour apple tree."

In fact, I was still humming that same tune when I was brushing Molly and stood back to admire her sleek coat. All of a sudden she arched her neck, pricked up her ears and whinnied.

"What do you hear, girl?"

Then I too heard hooves pounding along the road from St. Albans. Who in tarnation could be racing along our road? I could hardly believe it when a band of about twenty riders thundered past our drive. They had almost ridden past when . . . The last horseman reined his horse so quickly that he reared and I noticed another man with his arms around the rider's waist, hanging on for dear life. The first rider on the horse was wearing a grey Confederate cap. He trotted his horse right up side of Molly. The man behind him jumped off and grabbed a bridle that was hanging near her head. As he made a grab for her halter, she tossed her head up and down and started prancing as though she was dancing a real jig. Just then,Father came around the horse barn and hollered,

"Get away from that horse, you varmit, before she kills you. What in sam hill do you think you are doing here?"

The rider stepped his horse up to Father and yelled like he was some kind of Army Captain, "Bridle that horse!"

While Father and the horse thieves were talking really loud and angry and the other fella was trying to get a hold on Molly's halter, I slipped into the house and grabbed the old musket off the kitchen wall. I ran toward the horse thieves. The thief had taken the bridle off the shed wall and handed it to Father and bellowed,

"Bridle that horse!"

Father threw the bridle on the ground and said in a very stern voice,

"If you're so all fired smart, bridle your own horse."

I pointed the gun at the man on the horse and said,

"If you hurt my father or take Molly, I'll shoot you!"

Molly was two-steppin', three-steppin' and side-steppin' all over the place. She reared up and flailed her hooves at that thief. The whites of her eyes showed. She was acting as though she'd seen the devil and was aiming to get rid of him real fast.

Father didn't look in my direction, but looked at the man on the horse right in the eye and said,

"Harve, hold on, everything's gonna be all right."

It seemed as though it was the end of time while I eyed that man on the horse. My knees began to feel like jelly, but Father, talking calmly, made me hold that gun right on the man. It was touch and go³ as the rider⁴ put his hand on his pistol and started to draw it from the holster. He turned and looked me square in the eyes. Neither Father nor I moved a muscle. I held my breath. I was sure I was going to be blown from here to Kingdom come and could hardly believe I was hearing right when he said in a soft drawling voice, "Y'all jump up behind me, Bub. This lad and his pa are too brave to die. There'll be no shooting here."

As he turned his horse and Bub jumped up behind him, he touched his cap in a farewell salute, to Father and me, and started his horse in a wild run down the road toward Sheldon. I started to shake as though I had the chills. My stomach was churning as though I'd eaten too many green apples. Father came over, took the gun, and hugged me tight. He was breathing hard, eyes all watered up, as though he had the heaves and said,

"Harve, you sure saved Molly, by golden, son. You made us proud and thankful."

Ma and Toot came running out on the porch just in time to see the riders galloping out of the yard at a mad clip.

Father had just about time to put Molly in the barn and bolt the doors when we heard the thudding of horses' hooves in the distance. Tlit-Tlot⁵, nearer they came from the direction of St. Albans. As the horsemen came into sight, Father yelled,

"That's Captain George Conger from St. Albans⁶! He must be leading a posse of men to catch those horse-thieving bandits."

Father ran out to the road with us at his heels, and as we stood there, waving our arms and yelling, one of the last riders reined in his horse and called,

"The band of rebels that rode past here are wild, reckless men. They've robbed the banks in St. Albans, shot up the town, stolen horses and tried to burn several buildings. We're going to get 'em. They can't get away with this. Come on, Marsh, come with us."

He and his band of about fifty men rode past, as we stood stunned for a moment.

"Harve, get,Molly and saddle her up."

Molly sensed the excitement and was like a coiled spring, muscles of steel, quivering as I bridled and saddled her. Father talked to her,

"Calm down, girl, steady!"

He barely had time to get both feet in the stirrups as Molly shot off out of the yard.

Time just crawled by until he returned and told us how the bandits had tried to rob a bank in Sheldon, but it was closed. Then, they set fire to the bridge across the crick and rode like mad devils for Canada.

Next day, Father read us the account in the "St. Albans Daily Messanger," October 19, 1864.

After hearing Father read about the raid in the paper, it struck me all of a sudden that it all really happened. We heard that the raiders were finally captured at different points in Canada, and most of the money was returned. We were interested to learn that they were Confederates under the command of the youthful Bennett H. Young, a loyal soldier of the South.; Jefferson, Davis, President of the Confederacy, gave his blessing to Young and his followers in their attempt to terrorize the Northern states along the Canadian border in a last ditch stand, hoping troops might be diverted from the Union battlefields in the South. They had all worn haversacks over their right shoulders as an identification mark so they would be sure and recognize each other.

It was a great source of pride to Father and me that Bennett Young was heard to remark after his capture,

"The bravest people we met that day were a young boy and his Pa who had a great little mare and I'll always remember the father's fighting words, "If you re so all fired smart,