Volney stopped and turned the mare free with her head toward her home,
then mounted his own horse and popped his cow whip several times to give
her a good start. The mare dashed up to the front of the house with the
bell making a great clatter.
Mrs. Meadows went out, caught her mare, and discovered the frazzled
hickories, noted the ruffled hair over the mare's body, and imagined she
could see great welts and bruises where she had been unmercifully beaten
by "those vile Cavitt boys". As soon as it was possible for her to do
so, she went to town and filed a complaint against Volney Cavitt, as she
had learned he was the perpetrator of the outrageous deed.
No information was given out to the public except by Mrs. Meadows and
when the case was called for trial she was present, still feeling
agrieved at the outrage committed against an "unoffending saddle nag
owned by a poor defenseless widow woman", and she testified her saddle
mare had been wantonly and brutally beaten and produced the frazzled
hickories to correborate her testimony. Volney Cavitt's four brothers
told about the repeated depredations of Mrs. Meadows notoriously breachy
mare, and of their repeated and fruitless efforts to get the owner to
keep her in the lot or tie her head down to her forefoot. Since Mrs.
Meadows apparently made little or no effort to restrain the mare they
decided to resort to a ruse with the hope it would abate the nuisance.
As the plot was gradually unfolded before the court, Mrs. meadows was
surprised at first, then she evidenced chagrin, finallv when she
realized she was to be deprived of revenge and was being "laughed out of
court", she became furious and declared "No poor lone woman can hope to
secure justice in the courts these days." It would appear the Widow
Meadows was not made of as stern stuff as the young Widow Cavitt had
been.
True to their determinations Vol and Joe learned the business of
surveying, for until his untimely death, their father's friend, James
Coryell, helped instruct the boys in surveying. Quickwitted and clever
at self defense the two boys made good at the job they had chosen for
establishing themselves in the Robertson Colony, and soon each was
acquiring large tracts of land as fees for their labors. They learned by
doing in the stock raising business, farming and working their land
rented from Moore.
Land scrip and certificates owned by men who were afraid to risk their
scalps among the savage Indians or their hides among the wild animals
and hurtling heads of buffalo, or their general health to the outdoors
life the locators were foreed to live was turned over to the fearless
men who located the land and surveyed it, registering it with the proper
authorities. On May 24, 1834 William H. Steels was appointed land
commissioner for Robertson's Colony. He also had been a friend of James
Coryell and with his help, the Cavitt boys, Volney and Josephus, became
as successful locators as were in the colony.
The tax lists of 1854 show Cavitt Armstrong of Wheelock with 150 acres
under cultivation and 8000 acres unimproved lands, besides his 21
slaves--valued at various suns up to $1000 each. The stock raising and
farming that Andrew Cavitt had set about to accomplish was being carried
out by Whitley living quietly at home and looking out for the welfare of
his adored mother.
In 1854 Sheridan married and moved to Huntsville where he enlisted Sep.
5 1861, in the army of the Confederacy. Volney volunteered in the
Snivley Expedition and in the Moore-House Campaign. He later declared
that country through which they traveled was the most uncivilized and
sparsely settled of any country he had been in, and was infested with
ever known wild animal and "varmint."
--
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The most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or touched.
It must be felt with the heart. Helen Keller
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Last Blue Promise...Poetry and Links to All my Web Sites
http://www.fortunecity.com/bally/meath/45/index.html
OR
http://www.geocities.com/Paris/Bistro/6720/index.html
...It is in silence where music lies...
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Listowner CARRINGTON and CAVITT surnames
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