HANGED BY THE FEDERALS.

Otago Witness, Issue 2253, 6 May 1897, Page 42

HANGED BY THE FEDERALS.

By Ambrose Bieuce,

[The prisoner had bean caught in the act of tampering with the security of Owl Creek bridge. The Commandant had issued an order that any civilian caught interfering -\yith the railway or its bridges should be summarily hanged.]

A man stood upon a railway bridge in Northern Alabama looking down into the swift waters 20ft below. The man's hands were behind his back, the wrists bound with a chord. A rope loosely encircled his neck. It was attached to a stout cross timber above his head, and the slack fell to the level of his knees. Some loose boards laid upon the sleeper supporting the melals of the railway supplied a footing for him, and bis executioners were two private soldiers of the Federal army, directed by a sergeant, who in civil life' msy have been a deputy sheriff. At a short remove uDon the same temporary platform was an officer in the uniform of hi* rank, armed. He was a captain. A sentinel was placed at each end of the bridge. The man who was engaged in being hanged was apparently about 35 years of age. He was a civilian, if one might judge from his dress, which was that of a planter. His features were good — a straight nose, firm moutb, broad forehead, from which his long dark hair was combed straight back, falling behind his ears to the collar of his well-fitting frock coat. He wore a moustache and pointed beard, but no whiskers ; his eyes were large and dark grey, and had a kindly expression, which one would hardly have expected in one whose neck was in the hemp. Evidently this was no vulgar assassin. The liberal military code makes provision for hanging many kinds of people, and gentlemen are not excluded.

The preparations being complete, two private soldiers stepped aside, and each drew away the plank upon which he had been standing. The sergeant turned to the captain, saluted, and placed himself immediately behind that officer, who in turn moved apart one pace. These movements left the condemned man and the sergeant staffdirjg on the two ends of the same plank, which spanned three of the cross-ties of the bridge. The end upon which the civilian stood almost, bub not quite, reached a fourth. This plank had been held in place by the weight of the captain ; it was now held by that of the sergeant. At a signal from the former the latter wculd step aside, the plank would tilt, and the condemned man would go dotvn between the two ties. The arrangement commended itself to hi 3 judgment as simple and effective. His face had not been covered, nor his eyes bandaged. He looked a moment at his " unsteadfast footing," then let his gaza wander to the swirling water of the stream racing madly beneath his feet. A piece of dancing driftwood caugbb bis attention, and hi 3 eyes followed it down the cgrrent. How 3lowly it appeared to move ! What a sluggish stream 2

\ He closed his eyes in order to fix bis last thoughts upon his wife and children. The water touched to gold by the early bud, the brooding mists under the banks at some distance down the stream, the fort, tbe soldiers, the piece of drift — all had distracted him. And now he became conscious of a new disturbance. Striking' through the thought of his dear ones was a sound which he could neither ignore nor understand— a sharp, distinct, metallic perbussion like the stroke of a blacksmith's hammer upon the anvil ; it had the same ringing quality. He wondered what it was, and whether immeasurably distant or near by — it seemed both. Its recurrence was regular, but as alow as the tolling of a death knell. He awaited each stroke with impatience, and, t he knew not why— apprehension. The intervals of silence grew progressively longer ; the delays became maddening. With their greater infrequency the sounds increased in, strength and sharpness. They hurt his ear" like the thrust, of a knife ; he feared he would shriek. What he heard was the ticking of his watch. He unclosed his eyes and sav> again the water below him. "If I could free my hands," he thought, " I might throw off the noose and spring into the stream.' By diving I could evade the bullets, and, swimming ( vigorously, reach the bank, tako to the woods, and get away home. My home, thank God, is as yet outside their lines ; my wife and little ones are still beyond the invader's farthest advance." A« these thoughts, which have here to be set down in writing, were flashed into the [ doomed man's brain rather than evolved ! from it, the captain nodded to the sergeant. The sergeant stepped aside.

A? Peyton Farquhar fell straight downward through the bridge he .lost consciousness, and was as one already dead. From thiß state he was awakened — ages later, it ■ seemed to him — by the pain of a sharp pressure upon his throat, followed by a Bense of suffocation. Keen, poignant agonies seemed -* to shoot from his neck downward through every fibre of his body and limbs. These pains appeared to flash along well-defined lines of ramification, and to beat with an inconceivable rapid periodicity. They seemed like streams of pulsatirjg fire heating him to an intolerable temperature. As to his head, he was conscious of nothing but a feelirjg of fulness — of congestion. These sensations were unaccompanied by thought. The intellectual part of his fiature was already j effaced ; he had power only to feel, and feeling was torment. He was conscious of motion. Encompassed in a luminous cloud of which he was now merely the 'fiery heart, without material substance, he swung through unthinkable arcs of- oscillation, like a vast pendulum. Then all at once, with terrible suddenness, the light about him shot upward with the noise of a loud plash ; a frightful roaring was in hi 6 care, and all was cold and dark. The power of thought was restored ; he knew that the rope had broken, and he had fallen into the stream. There was no additional strangulation ; the noose about his neck was already suffocating him, and kept the water fr,om his lungs. He was not conscious of an effort, but a sharp pain in his wrists apprised him that he was trying to free his hands. He gave the struggle his attention, as an idler might' observe the feat of a juggler, without interest in the outcome. Wliao a splendid effort I — what magnificent, what superhuman strength I Ab, that was a fine endeavour ! Bravo 1 The cord fell away : bis anna parted I and floated upward, the hands dimly seen on each side in the growing light. He watched them with a new interest as first one and then ' the other pounced upon the noose at his neck. They tore it away and> thrust it fiercely aside, its undulations resembling . those of a water snake. " Pat it back, pus ifc back ! '' He thought he shouted these words'to his hands, for the undoing of the noose had been succeeded by the direst pang which he had experienced. His neck ached horribly ; his brain was on fire ; hiu heart, which- had been fluttering faintly, gave a great leap, trying to forcß itself out at his moutb. His whole body was racked and wrenched with an insupportable anguiohl But his disobedient hands gave no heed to the command. They beat tbe water vigorously with quick downward strokes, forcing him to the surface. He felt his head emerge — his eyes were blinded by the sunlight— his chest expanded convulsively, and with a supreme and crowning agony his lungs en- | gnlphed a great draught of air, which instantly he expelled in a shriek ! j He was now in full possession of bis physical senses. They wer<>, indeed, preter- . naturally keen and alert. Something in the" awful disturbances of his organic system had so exalted and refined them that they made record of things never before perceived. He had come to the surface facing down the stream ; 'in a moment the visible world seemed to wheel slowly round, himself the pivotal point, aad he saw the bridge, the fort, the soldiers upon the bridge, tbe captain, the sergeant, the two privates, his executioners. They were in silhouette against the clear sky. They Bhouted and gesticulated, pointing at him. The captain bad drawn bis pistol, but did not fire ; the others were unarmed. Their movements were groteeque and horrible, their forms gigantic. Suddenly he heard a sharp report, and something strusk the water within a few inches of his head, spattering his face with spray. He heard a, second report, and caw one of the sentinels with his rifle at his shoulder, alight cloud of blue smoke rising from the muzzle. The man in the water saw the eve of the

man on the bridge glaring into his own through the sights of the rifle. He observed that it wa3 a grey eye, and remembered having read that grey eye's were keenest, and that all famous marksmen had them. Nevertheless this one had missed. A counter swirl had caught Farquhar and turned him half round; he was again looking into the forest on the bank opposite the fort. The sound of a clear, high voice in a monotonous aing-song now rang out behind him and came across the water with a distinctness that pierced and subdued all other Bounds, even the beating of the ripples in his ear?. Although no soldier, he had frequented camps enough to know the dread significance of that deliberate, drawling, aspirated chant ; the lieutenant on shore was takfrg

a iSart in the morning's work. How cold and pitilessly— : with what an even, calm intonation, presaging and enforcing tranquility in the men — with what accurately measured intervals fell those cruel words : " Attention, company. Shoulder arms. Rsady. Aim. Fire 1 "

,jjfarquhar dived — dived as deeply as he could. The water roared in his ears like the voice of Niagara, yet he heard the dulled thunder of the volley, and, rising sgain towards the surface, met shining bits of metal, singularly flattened, oscillating slowly downward. Some of them touched him on |the face and hands, then fell away, continuing their descent. One lodged between his collar and neck ; it was uncomfortably warm ; and he snatched it out. As he rose to the surface gasping for breath, be saw that he had been a long time under water ; he was perceptibly further down stream — nearer to safety. The soldiers had almost finished reloading; the metal ramrods flashed all at once in the sunshine as they were drawn from the barrels, turned in Hie air, and thrust into their sockets. The two sentinels fired again, independently and ineffectually.

The hunted man saw all this over his shoulder ; he was now swimming vigorously with the current. His brain was as energetic as his arms and legs ; he thought, with the rapidity of lightning. "The officer," lie thought, "will not make that martinet's error a second time. It was as easy to dodge a volley as a, single shot. He has probably already given the command to fire at will. God help me, I cannot dodge them ail 1 " An appalling plash within two yards of him, followed by a loud rushirg sound, dimuendo, which seemed to travel back through the air to tha fort and died in an explosion which stirred the very river to its deep 3 ! A rising sheet of water, which curved over him, fell down upon him, blinded him, strangled him I The cannon had taken a hand in the game. Suddenly he felt himself whirled round and round — spinning like a top. Thß water, the banke, the forest, the now distant bridge, fort, and men — all were commingled and blurred. Objects were represented by their colours only; circular horizontal streaks of colour — that was all he saw. He had been caught in a vortex and was being whirled on with a velocity of advance and gyration which made him giddy and sick. In a few moments he was flung upon the gravel at the foot of the left bank of the Btreani — the southern bank — and behind a projecting point which concealed him from bis enemies. The sudden arrest of his motion, the abrasion of one of his hands on the gravel, restored him, and. he •wept with delight.' He dug his fingers into the sand, threw it over himself in handfuls, acri audibly blessed it.

A whizz and rattle of grapeshot among the branches high above his head roused him from his dream. The baffled cannoneer had tired him a random farewell. He sprang to his feet, rushed up the sloping bank, and ■pluDged into the forest. All that day h9 Travelled, laying bis course by the roundiDg muj. The forest seemed interminable; novfhere did he discover a break in it, not even a. woodman's road. He had not known that i he lived in so wild a. region. There was | something uncanny in the revelation. His | neck was in pain, and, lifting his hand to it ! he found it horribly swollen. He knew that j it bad a circle of black where the rope had J bruised it. His eyes felt congested ; he could no longer close them. His tongue was swollen with thirst ; he relieved its tever by thrusting it forward from between his teeth into the cool air. How softly the < urf had carpeted the nntravelled avenue ! He could no longer feel the roadway beneath his feet I Doubtless, despite his suffering, he fell asleep while walking, for now he sees another seene — perhaps ha has merely recovered from a delirium. He stands at the gate cf his own home. All is as he left it, and all bright and beautiful in the morning Eunshine. He must have travelled the entire night. As he pushes open the gate and passes up the wide white walk ha sees a flutter of female garments ; his wife, looking ire«h and cool and sweet, steps down from tbe verandah to meet him. At tbe bottom of the steps she stands waiting with a smile ot ineffable joy, an attitude of matchless # rsce and dignity. Ab, how beautiful she is ! He springs forward with extended arms. As he is about to clasp her he feels a stunning blow upon the back of the neck ; a blindiDg white light blazes all about him with a Bound like 'the shock of a cannon ; then all is darkless and silence 1 Pay ton Farquhar was dead, and his body with a broken neck swung gently from side to side beneath the - timbers of the Owl Greek bridge.