Search America's historic newspaper pages from 1756-1963 or use the U.S. Newspaper Directory to find information about American newspapers published between 1690-present. Chronicling America is sponsored jointly by the National Endowment for the Humanities external link and the Library of Congress. Learn more
Image provided by: University of Maryland, College Park, MD
Newspaper Page Text
Miwro Hl! mote. VOL. 2. NO. 26. POINT LOOKOUT. MD„ MAY 11,1864. WHOLE NO. 78. Written for the Hammond Gazette. STRIKE FOR FREEDOM, BY JAMES M’OONNELL, CO. B, STH N. H. V. A nation speaks—the glorious word Resounds o’er land and sea, And on each passing breeze is heard The cry of “ Liberty.” O’er mountain and o’er vale It flies, No power its might can stay, The tyrant quails—freemen arise. We need your aid to-day. A nation speaks—her men march forth In freedom’s sacred cause— Praise to the freedom loving North, Her sword she nobly draws. Words are not all that she can dare, She's ever ready found Against the tyrant to repair And smite him to the giound. A nation speaks— ’ tis freedom's peal Soaring far higher still, Oh when the strength of right we feel, What can resist our will. March on then —on, for justice' sake, The rebel foes appal— When freedom tells you to awake, Strike for her ohe and all. ;— —.—. From the New York Ledger. WALLACE KEENE’S REVENGE. BY AMY RANDOLPH. It was about half an hour after sunset, but the orange light still burned above the lonely southern valley. The trembling diamond of the evening star was hanging over the green silences of the fragrant Tennessee woods: the columns of pearl-gray mist ascended, likfe va por-wreathed phatitotnS from the river-course, and, from the dense thickets that skirted the camp ground, came, ever and anon, the mourn ful cry of whip-poor-wills, sounding faint and low, like the remembered echoes of a dream.— It was a sweet nook in the heart of the unbroken wilderness —yet Wallach Keene would have given well nigh all he was Worth to exchange its luxuriant verdure, one moment only, for the pine-clad heights and salt winds of Maine, with russet-winged robinS chirping their familiar madrigals in the apple orchards below, and cornfields breaking intb billowy ripples of green at the touch of every wayward breeze. Nor, brave soldier and tried warrior though he was, would Captain Keene have denied the thought. Was it not for the security of those very heights and hills that he was battling even now ? What would a soldier be worth whose heart did not hold a warm corner for the mem ories of home ? “ Two years ago, this very month, I left home,” murmured Wallace Keene, as he folded his arms across his breast and gazed thought fully but where the phrple sky seemed to touch the green pennons of the waving woods. “It is just two years since young Harney told me with such an imperial air that he never would give Marion to ‘a common mechanic’ —yet tha [truth, JUSTJCE, MERCY, —UNION, LIBERTY, COUNTRY.] wound rankles sharply still. I wonder if a man ever could forget gratuitous insult like that!— She loved me, too, darling little May, though she was Squire Harney’s daughter, and I but a poor young carpenter lad. Ah me ! home would not be home, now, with Marion Harney married and gone. Perhaps it was for the best—poor May ; yet /shall remain true to that first, last love, until death blots out all thought or mem ory of earthly things. Sometimes I speculate whether Harney would have given to Captain Keene the precious gift he refused the ‘common mechanic.’ The men marvel at what they call my ‘dare-devil recklessness;’ I believe they fan cy me a man of iron, without heart or feeling. Well—better so; yet May could have given a different version of my character. 0, May ! May ! my sweet, lost jewel! if I could be sure that you were happy !” Only one sob, strong and convulsive as the throe of an earthquake, heaved up from the sol dier’s heart, as his head drooped for an instant upon his breast, and then, with a strong effort of will, he closed the chamber of his secret an guish—the hidden cell where memory and sor row kept eternal watch and ward. “Captain—if yon please, sir ” “Is that you, Spicer? What now?” And Captain Keene turned his cold, quiet face towards the opening of the tent, by courtesj called a door, where Private Spicer’s head was just visible—a shaggy mat of carrot-red curls. “Why, sir, our fellows have just brought in that lot o’ men’twas hurt in that scrimmage over the river this morning, and some on ’em is wounded bad. There’s no use in talkin’ about forwardin’ ’em on to hospital till tb-morrow — would you come, and ,’ Captain Keene rose. “I will be there directly, Spicer.’’ Thert? was a little crowd of men gathered on the riter-shore, in the warm glow of the spring twilight, but they silently parted right and left for Captain Keene’s tall figure to pass through their midst. "Six or seven dusty, bleeding men were sitting and lying around in various postures, theii ghastly brows made still paler, by the faint, un certain glimmer of the young moon. Keene glanced quickly around, taking in the whole scene in that one brief survey, then knelt down beside the nearest figure. “This is a bad business, Conner —are you much hurt?” “It was Lieutenant Ordway’s doings, Cap tain,” said the man, faintly, speaking through his set teeth. “ Twouldn’t ha’ been so if you had led us! ’ “Never mind what it would Have been or would not,” said Keene, quietly. “It is over, now, and cannot be helped. The next question is, how and where I am to dispose of you all.” He rose to his feet again and stood thought fully looking at the group, askingtiow and then a question, as though he were revolving some arrangement in his mind “Bruce,” said he, turning to a man in the rear, “let Ordway’s tent be cleared—he will have no further use for it, poor fellow, and ” He stopped short as his eye fell on a new face, half shadowed by the green sweep of drooping alders—a pale, blood-streaked face with a gap ing cut on the forehead. “ That is not one of our men,” he exclaimed, sharply. “How came he here ?” “No, sir,” explained Spicer, stepping forward “I think he belonged to the Eigth. I’m sure I don’t know how he ever got mixed up with our fellows, but there he was, and I thought we’d better not wait for their ambulance, but bring him straight here.” “Right,” briefly pronounced Keene, stooping over the insensible figure. “Let them carry him to my tent, Spicer.” “I beg your pardon, Captain—to your tent?’ “Didn't you hear what I said?” sharply in terrogated the superior officer. “Bruce, make the others comfortable in Lieutenant Ordw iy’s quarters —there will be plenty of room for them there.” “Well, I’m beat!” ejaculated Spicer, five or ten minutes afterwards, as he came out of the Captain's tent, scratching his shock of coarse red curls. “Beat, be you ?” growled a comrade in arms who was trying to “stop a leak,” as he phrased it, in his fatigue cap, with the help of an iron thimble and a coarse needle, in the light of a flickering lantern. “What’s the matter?” “Matter enough. I wish you could ha’ seen Captain Keene pourin' sperits between that man’s teeth, and washin’ the blood off his face, as keerful as the doctor himself.” “Humph !” returned his friend, stowing a supply of tobacco deftly into his left cheek.— “The Captain has queer streaks; but I don’t want to fight under a better officer, and that, I take it, is all that consarns Us.” Meanwhile the dim light of a lamp swinging from the center of the little tent shone full on the singular group within its circling folds— the wounded private lying like a corpse, still and pale, on the narrow iron bedstead, the young officer leaning over him and supporting his head with almost Womanly tenderness—and the brisk, gray-eyed little surgeon keenly sur veying both as he unfolded his case of vials and powders. “He is not dead, Doctor !” Wallace Keene’s voice had a wild, imploring accent as he spoke—his eager eyes seemed as though they would search the other’s very soul. The surgeon silently felt the pulse, and held a tiny mirror over the mouth, then replied : “No; but he would have been in another half hour. Your prompt remedies have saved his life, Captain Keene.” “Thank God I—oh ! thank God !” [concluded next week.] One man asked another why his hair was white and his beard brown. “Because” said he, “one is twenty years younger that the other.