The Bessemer Indicator

THE FATED SUGAR CAMP.

ITS RECORD is RED WITH HUMAN BLOOD.

Death In One Form or Another Haunted the Ill-Omened Spot—Jennie Liked the City Chap and Her Country Lover Swore Vengeance on Him.

Not many miles from Lawrenceburg, Ind., and but a short distance from the Ohio state line, was a sugar camp that had been operated every spring for a number of years, and was quite a resort for young folks during the "boiling time."

That year a young medical student from Cincinnati came out with an acquaintance to spend a few days in the country.

A visit was made to the sugar camp, and the city chap became enamored of the novel life and prolonged his stay. He attended the suppers in the woods, went to the dances and parties, and, by his style and pleasant ways, soon made himself a welcome guest in all the entertainments. At one of the little "socials" he met a bright young country maiden, whose beauty completely captivated him. It had been understood that she was engaged to be married to a young fellow who worked on the farm adjoining her father's lands, and the prospective husband was preparing to secure a home for the coming event. Her lover had taken her to the dance, where she became acquainted with the city visitor, and where she was speedily won by his dashing manner and fulsome compliments. In her giddy vanity and capriciousness she had refused the society of her country beau for the company of the more stylishly attired Mr. Tulon with his city airs. The farmer youth bore the slights and humiliation with no evidence of anger or disappointment until the gathering broke up and the guests were preparing to depart.

Then, approaching her, he expressed his readiness to accompany her home as usual, but was abruptly refused, and told that Mr. Tulon had asked to escort her and she was going with him. Taking the arm of her new admirer she laughed at the discomfiture of the rejected suitor as they passed him near the doorway.

For a time the poor fellow stood stunned by the treatment tendered him, until a sympathetic friend approached and kindly said: "Never mind the girl, Fred Drane; there are just as good fish in the sea as ever were caught." "Oh yes, I know that," responded Drane; "but, by G-d, the fellow shall never go with Jennie again."

A crowd of young fellows had been asked to assemble at camp on the ensuing night and assist in the "sugaring off" process, as it was termed, says the Cincinnati Enquirer. Drane had promised to attend, but when he learned that the city gent was invited, and expected to be present, he refused to go. A turkey supper had been arranged for the occasion, and when the midnight hour was drawing nigh all parties gathered about the big fire waiting the call to the feast that was being spread near by.

Tulon was standing near the roaring flames, singing a love song for the entertainment of his companions, when a loud report of a rifle rang out. The young singer gave a piercing shriek that echoed through the darkened depths, and springing forward fell headlong into the flaming fire.

His startled companions fled in terror, and before they recovered sufficiently to return and remove the body it was burned beyond recognition. The charred corpse was taken to the house and prepared for burial, in the room where the night before he had been the hero of the evening. The assassin was not known, but the jilted lover was accused of the murder, and before the victim of his crime was laid away in a premature grave Fred Drane had fled to parts unknown and was never heard of afterward.

The girl, whose fickleness was responsible for the deed, married some years later, and an interesting and respectable family survive her to this day. The next season a hurricane swept over the old camp with such fury as to entirely destroy it for sugar-making, but did not dispel the spirit of death that lurked in its silent shade.

When the workmen were clearing away the broken and fallen timbers, a heavy limb, that had lodged in the forks of a slivered tree, became loosened, and fell with deadly force upon the person of a young man named Sefert and crushed the life out of him, almost on the identical spot where a year before Tulon had fallen before the assassin's murderous bullet.

The old camp, with its record of death, was forgotten and the farm changed hands. The old farmhouse remained the same under the new owner, whose name was Scoggins.

Scoggins was sitting by the side of the supper table reading to his wife, who was washing the dishes at the same table. A single tallow candle furnished light for both. She was listening intently to the account of some mysterious murder he was reading about when interrupted by the loud roar of a gun, followed by the crash of shivering glass, that told the shot had been fired through the window from the outside. The paper fell from the nerveless hands of her husband as he sank dead to the floor, with a leaden slug through his brain.

Another one tore the dishcloth from the fingers of the frightened woman, who, reaching over the table to grasp her falling husband, knocked over the candle, extinguishing the light, thus leaving her in darkness and in the presence of death.

Her terrified screams were heard by passing parties, who rushed to her assistance, relit the candle, raised the dead body from the blood-stained floor and placed it upon the bed. A neighbor named Jackson was suspected, because of a quarrel between him and the deceased and threats he had made against Scoggins. He was arrested and tried for the crime at Lawrenceburg, Ind., but no positive proof being produced against him, the jury were forced to acquit him, and, being shunned by his neighbors, he sold out his property and moved away to the far-distant West.

The old farmhouse stood for many years, but no more parties or dances were ever given beneath its roof, for it was believed to be surrounded by an ill omen.