Evening Star Newspaper, June 28, 1931, Page 87

Or How Paul Revere Warned the People of Wayne’s Camp, Arizona, JustFiftyYears Ago—A Fourthof July StoryThat Is Decidedly Differ- ent. BY E. O. ARNOLD. Pictures by Joe King. HE Declaration of Independence was written and signed again with much formality one morning nearly 50 years ago at a little settlement in Northern Arizona, known then as Wayne's Camp. Ben Franklin was there, more or less full of epigrams and liquor. Patrick Henry again voiced his challenge to political oppression, and the romantic Paul Revere galloped through the countryside shout- ing “The Red Coats are coming! To arms! To arms!” The occasion was a pioneer observance of July 4, an all-day get-togethzr and celebration during which several beloved bits of American history were re-enacted. Done, of course, in a simple spirit of patriotism and fun, the day’s theatricals nevertheless begat several episodes of real drama. Eefore noon that day the whole community had been convulsed in laughter, but before the sun set these same people had witnessed a flow of blood. Hamilcar “Sinkiller” Pool is authority for the story of that day’s celebration. Sinkiller ought to know about it; he was there. He was an itinerant preacher in those days, and about the only man in the wild territory with a smat- tering of book education. This, and his experience at “standin’ up on his feet and talkin’ to people” predestined him to play two major roles in the day’s theatricals. As Patrick Henry he yelled “Give me liberty or give me death!” with great dignity of man- ner and mien; as Paul Revere he dashed around to give warning of an entirely unsuspected danger. INKILLER POOL is 73, he thinks. When he ran away from foster parents in Virginia (where, by the way, he first memorized some of Henry’s orations) he had been preaching a couple of years as an apprentice pastor. He wanted to start out for the Lord on his own, and the wild Western country lured him. He had scarcely turned 20 when he opened his first church and preached his first sermon to & group of rough miners in California. Because he publicly denounced the men who gambled this congregation rode him out of town astride a sapling pole and somehow or other he drifted into the territory of Arizona. His recent years have been spent mostly in - THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, D. “About that there Pourth of July celebra- tion? Well, it was a good one, right enough. I had preached at Wayne's Camp one Sunday in June. Out in the open because it was warm, and there wasn't no church nohow. Indians was terrible vengeful in them days. “But as I was saying, I preached there f the fust time in June, and sort of got sweet on a gal there—you know how ’tis. So ’'stead of riding on I stayed to preach ag’in, and directly on the side, so it just naturally fell my duty to git up the Independence day program, which I done.” ‘The good people of Wayne’'s Camp fell right in with Rev. Pool's ideas for a rousing Fourth episodes. The woman folks worked their fingers and their imaginations to produce costumes that resembled (however slightly) the tight breeches and frocks and coats and hats and powdered wigs representative of the Washingtonian period. Sinkiller Pool worked hard and ‘The pioneer people were delighted to find a new sort of diversion there in the isolated mining camp where amusement of any sort was rare indeed. They co-operated willingly, got as mueh fun out of the two or three rehearsals as they expected out of the final show itself. News of the proposed celebration traveled out into the hills. The country was far from being populous then—indeed, it is not thickly settled yet—but there was a scattering of hunters, traders, ranchers, prospectors and what not %o whom the news sounded enticing. ANY leather-skinned individuals who had never heard of Benjamin FranklMn or George Washington set their plans to ride in and make pioneer whoopee with the people who had heard. The cause for a party was a minor matter, the party itself was the thing. Sinkiller literally radiated enthusiasm, and a driving spirit for community betterment con- sumed him. It poured out the following Sun- day morning in the pulpit, when he thoroughly damned the gamblers and whisky drinkers of the town. So thoroughly did he damn them that they set him astride and hooted him out of the region. By Wednesday he was back, a out the leader of the hoodlums ‘tion that Sinkiller C. JUNE 28 1931. gt “I said I would go off & ways and gallop upy trying to act like Paul Revere done . ol - . off and started back, lickety-split, hell-bent fow leather . . . Had on one of them cocked hats and carried‘a lantern, and every time I passed somebody I'd holler, ‘The Red Coats .Arq of the celcbration spread everywhere and be- came the chief topic of conversation; social It was to be an all-day gathering, a holiday, with noon dinner on the ground, picnic style, playing Benjamin Franklin for us,” Sinkiller Pool tells. “Ike looked sort of like the pictures of Franklin, time me and Miz Green—she helped any blankety-blank man there to say he wasn't! ‘“Well, sir, we had mittee to take old Ike likkered up that he went to sleep disturb meeting any more. well without a Ben Pranklin, anyhow.” IN due course the young preacher, Hamilcar Pool, read sonorously the wording of the Declaration of Independence, placed the docu- ment upon a barrel (serving as a table) and each of the Colonial representatives stepped forward to officially “sign” it. The third “signer” hesitated, and grew em- barrassed as he took the goose quill. He turned in an agony of stage fright toward the young preacher-master-of-ceremonies. Sinkiller Pool was quick witted. “Just make gome marks, it tain’t legal, mo- how,” he whispered. And so the embarrassed actor was saved the ignominy of having his inability to write pro- claimed to the assembled spectators. That “act” went over big, but it was as nothing compared to the next, which featured the Rev. Hamilcar Pool (again!) playing the immortal role of Patrick Henry. Henry's own voice never stirred a more at- tentive audichce. It was a good speech—there in the rough and illiterate mining" camp—even if more than half the listeners didn’t under- stand it. One nearly deaf member of the en- * thralled audience arose at one juncture to shout “Glory hallelujah!” on the mistaken assump- Pool, being & preacher, naturally was preaching a sermon that day! But that wasn’t all. Coming!”” In fact it was just a good prelude to the red® climactic part of the day's celebration, a8 Sinkiller Pool tells it now. “E was the big that day,” he relates; “and nothing would do but what I must also be Paul Revere. “I didnt mind terrible, for thc reason tha§ it gave me one more chanct to show off beforé my gal. She was purty as a picture that day, hot dawg i she wasn't! “Well, I was young and spry, so about middi@ Ighioriowed a paint horse fromi and gallop up, trying to act like Paul Revere done. “I rid off and starfed back, lickety-split, hell-bent fer leather. Had on one of them I passed somebody I'd Boller are coming! To arms! To was a laughing and enjoying it. on out of town a half mile or horse could go, and all of a come onto two old grizzled fellers with and packs on their shoulders. They was arrivals for the festivities. “I swerved my horse past them and shouted ‘The Red Coats ‘er coming! To arms! To arms!’ oS “They started running Hke the old nick, and That was all—for the moment—Mr. Pool says. The people then pitched in and ate their lunch. It was a grand picnic. Must have been 300 people or so there. The afternoon was given mostly to community singing. Some of the boys took part in foot races and some of the older men got happily drunk. Sinkiller preached a sermon against drunkenness and gambling about 3 p.m., bué before he was done a band of painted, yelling, shooting Apache Indians dashed out of their hiding places and swooped down onto the settlement of Wayne’s Camp! Apeches had killed many people in Arie zons, since away back in Civil War days, and themselves had suffered many cruelties and had own courage for a second rush was abetted b the seeming disorder of the whites. The red began their inevitable circlingy and at intervals groups would dash in to shoo§ at close range. * all of the men present at the celes brought their guns with the= part of the country in t! was an ever-present th: Continued on Ninct-enth Page