Monday, July 23, 2018

The Highwayman of Moor's Gap




Here's how our fourth grade teacher, Erskine Batson, first told us about the Highwayman -  

“This place is full of history,” Erskine told us, shaking his head a little. “Surprising that nobody seems to talk about it.
“As the story goes, Uncle Jasper says there was a famous robber that hid out in these woods. He robbed the stage coach on several occasions, and always got away with it. Rode a beautiful Andalusian horse he’d bought from the Moor, the inn keeper. For years he pestered travelers on this road, stole gold and silver coins and jewelry.
He finally got caught. A troop of soldiers was layin’ for him out here in the woods, one night. Shot him right here, in front of the inn.
“They called him the Highwayman,” Erskine added as he snapped the stem off a dead weed and started scratching the back of his head with it.
“Uncle Jasper says he’d never harmed a soul. Stole a bunch of loot, though. President James Buchanan hisself had put out a warrant for our Highwayman, put a bounty on his head, because of this being an important travel route down through here to the southern shipping ports.”

It seemed to me like Erskine’s tale had finally jogged something loose in my brain. 
“The Highwayman? I’ve heard Papa Jasper sing that song about the Highwayman! It’s a sad song.” 

“Um hm,” Erskine agreed. “He sang that song for me just a few days ago, when I was pickin’ at him for information. It’s a sad tune, all right. But the song was originally copied from a poem written by an Englishman named Alfred Noyes, about a robber highwayman in old England. But it’s so close to the same story that happened here, Uncle Jasper says when he was a boy, everybody thought the song was written about the Moor’s Gap highwayman. The poem, too. A strange case of coincidence. King George’s army killed the highwayman in England, and it was the local militia killed our highwayman here on Moor’s Gap Road. Shot him dead, with his sweetheart lookin’ on.”

Erskine sighed and turned to face me and my cousin.

“The moral of the story is, crime doesn’t pay,” he concluded.


The Witches of Moonlight Ridge

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