DEAD CAT ON THE LINE

 “Did I request thee, Maker, from my clay to mold me man? Did I solicit thee from darkness to promote me?”- From the book cover of Frankenstein; or The Modern Prometheus by Mary Shelley 1818

       In the eighteenth century, the early North American Christian Church (Moravian, Quaker, Dutch Reformed, Anglican, Methodist, Anabaptist, Mennonite, Episcopal, Presbyterian, &c.) was firmly planted at the center of the vortex in New York, fueling expansionism at the edge of the frontier. English debt and unwarranted taxes to the colonies, as well as a very real sense of place and rebellion amongst the congregants, was assimilated, then preached back from the pulpit. The constraining tentacles of the Anglican Crown, and their feudal landlord emissaries, were being challenged by the stirring populous of immigrants in America. Revolution was in the air—then right out your front door. 

     Catholicism was secure in Canada, but hidden out of sight and crimnalized in the colonies for generations, as any avowed “Papist,” ran the risk of arrest, or even death. These  counties aren’t named Ulster and Orange for nothing. Judaism was so rare as to barely warrant discrimination. As missionary tailwinds off the Atlantic grew stronger, the institutional Christian church pushed west, converting the Indian, and acquiring property. At the core of this mindset, lay an irrational fear that if the “savage” was not conquered, and the infidel not subdued, the white Christian would be at risk of “going native,” and all would be lost to the evils of pluralism, diversity, and sin. Slavery, extermination of sin (and the Indian), were seen as multiple sides of the same coin—Manifest Destiny!

    By the “step lively era,” the eastern states were being chopped up into smaller counties, further removing Indian nomenclature, replacing it with nativist toponymy. Towns and counties started being named and renamed after Revolutionary War “heroes,” Americanizing the countryside. Wardsbridge became Montgomery, after the ill-fated General Richard Montgomery, who unsuccessfully invaded Canada in 1775. The northern most part of Albany County was named for Gov. George Clinton. You didn’t even have to be a winner (or decent) to get a town or county named after you. In 1806 the bleu mountains of Ulster became Sullivan County, where I live. This eastern Catskill paradise is named for Maj. General John Sullivan, not a loser, but a war criminal. 

     A few years ago I advocated to change the name of the County. Citing General John Sullivan and General James Clinton’s complicity in the mass murder of  Six Nation noncombatants and the “scorched earth” tactics of the Sullivan/Clinton Expedition, I felt at the very least a different “Sullivan” would be in order. Then we wouldn’t have to pay to have the signs and letterheads changed, but we would have to assess General Sullivan’s crimes. My proposal, presented to local government in Monticello, met with rolled eyes, groans, then stoney silence. They thanked me for my opinion and moved on. It went no further. It’s not exactly truth and reconciliation, but it’s a token start. I haven’t given up. In the words of an Arthur S. Sullivan song, “onward Christian soldiers…”  

      

     Once the hanging was over, the celebration in Goshen was just beginning. The population of the village had swelled to thousands of revelers on the streets. Taverns were overflowing and drunk soldiers, strangers, and residents alike, spilled onto the dirt roads and narrow alleyways of Goshen. Some were disappointed that all four men had not hanged, but most felt it was a perfectly good, and proper, hanging. Even though there was still some drunken talk of lynching Jack Hodges, nobody made a move towards the gaol.

     When an Army sergeant fired his musket in the air in celebration, he was sternly told by a Goshen constable not to do it again. He apologized, reloaded and fired it once more, in front of the constable. More guns and canon could be heard going off all through the night. Nobody paid any attention to the law, and the sheriff was powerless to intercede. The societal cyst had burst, and once more a damaged, and traumatized, Goshen was on the mend.

    

    One brutally cold day, in the midst of writing this, I took a ride over to Sugar Loaf. Having lived in the area my entire life, I had never been to the little hamlet of Sugar Loaf. Spying the knob from Rt. 17, I turned right. About a mile out of the village I looked up across an open field towards “Sugar Loaf Mountain,” and caught sight of a tiny grouping of ancient grave stones, fenced off in the middle of the field. I couldn’t resist. Pulling the car into a parking lot, I read a notice attached to a bulletin board. The field was now a little park, designed by a boy scout for his Eagle badge, that encompassed Knapp’s view. The notice behind the glass explained that in the early 19th century, Nathaniel Knapp had been attacked in that field by a bear and grateful to have survived, wanted to be buried on the exact spot where the bear had nearly killed him. The gravestones, that were barely legible, had the names of many Knapps (Knaps), a few Carpenters, and very possibly more than one Teed. Less than an hour from my house I found myself standing over the bones of my alien dear ones.  

   

    Nathanial Knapp was married to Jame’s Teed’s sister Deborah Teed. He would be the one to bury his executed brother-in-law properly in his field. The day after the hanging Nathaniel Knapp walked over to his sister-in-law, Hannah’s house. He told her, that if she wanted, she should come to say goodbye to her husband. They had laid brother James out proper on a table in the living room, and would bury him on the Sabbath. She thanked Knapp for finding a spot to bury James. The thought of stepping into a house with her husband dead on the table was too much for Hannah to bare. She told him he was welcome to go to the still house and help himself—if there was anything left.

     The Sheriff had already posted a writ of eviction on their front door. The county was foreclosing on the Teed/Dunning house and property, for “costs of execution.” She, and her children, had one week to vacate the premises or she would be returned to the gaol.                                        

     David Dunning had no kin in Goshen or Sugar Loaf, other than his wife Margaret and children, now evicted, destitute, and all missing. Although there was some talk of friends paying for his burial, that never materialized. Having no other choice, the Sheriff ordered Dunning’s body to be interred down by the village dump. Eager to join the party in town, Jack Penney and another constable put Dunning in his shallow grave well before dark, and went off to join the festivities. They dug the hole just deep enough to cover the coffin lid, and slid the pine box in. Shovels slapped the loose earth on the lid, echoing across the Wallkill. Then they tossed the shovels with a clatter, into the back of the same wagon that Dunning and Teed had rode in only hours earlier. Lying in his sappy box, barely covered by dirt, Dunning was not quite ready to, “go hence and be no more seen.”