October Twenty-Second
Oh, the rolling, rolling prairies, and the grasses waving, waving
Like green billows ’neath the gulf breeze in the perfumed purple gloam!
Oh, my heart is heavy, heavy, and my eyes are craving, craving
For the fertile plains and forests of my far-off Texas home.
Judd Mortimer Lewis
(Longing for Texas)
Samuel Houston inaugurated President of Texas, 1836
October Twenty-Third
BEARING THE NEWS FROM YORKTOWN TO PHILADELPHIA
All the night of the 22d he rode up the peninsula, not a sound disturbing the silence of the darkness except the beat of his horse’s hoofs. Every three or four hours he would ride up to a lonely homestead, still and quiet and dark in the first slumbers of the night, and thunder on the door with his sword: “Cornwallis is taken: a fresh horse for the Congress!” Like an electric shock the house would flash with an instant light and echo with the pattering feet of women, and before a dozen greetings could be exchanged, and but a word given of the fate of the loved ones at York, Tilghman would vanish in the gloom, leaving a trail of glory and joy behind him.
Bradley T. Johnson
Col. Tench Tilghman’s ride, 1781