The thunder roared, the lightning flashed,
And through the cloud some horsemen dashed,
The field was high, but there was mud,
For it was wet and red with blood.
It was a short, but bloody fight,
It filled the Tories all with fright—
They whipped the Tories, that was right.
The battlefield with blood was red,
And covered with wounded and with dead.
They smote and fell, who raised a hand,
To wipe the rebels from the land.
The Americans won that glorious fight
That put them all to thinking right,
They believed they should soon make their laws
And God was with their righteous cause.
[WILLIAM CLEGHORN.]
In the spring of 1728, a handful of sturdy Scotchmen started from Chelmart, Scotland, for America, "The Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave." Among these were the parents of the boy William Cleghorn, whose true story is herein narrated.
He was a frail lad and partly for the love of the sea and partly for his health, he enlisted in the Navy. We find him enrolled at Brunswick, N. C., September 8th, 1748, as a member of Capt. Samuel Corbin's Company. He proved a daring sailor, yet he was not so interested in the Navy but that he had time to fall desperately in love with sweet Thankful Dexter, of Falmouth.
Now, Thankful's father was a man of wealth, great wealth, for those days, and a son-in-law, with nothing to recommend him but good looks and a fine record as a daring sailor, did not appeal to him, but demure, sweet Thankful had a will of her own. She saw that young William was worthy of any woman's love, so never for an instant did she even think of giving him up.
As time went on our hero began to be a power in the colonies. He was interested in everything pertaining to their welfare. He soon began to prosper financially, and on February 12, 1782, we find recorded that he gave security for twenty thousand ($20,000.00) dollars, and took command of the ten-gun ship "Virginia." Rickerton, the historian, tells us in his history that our hero was "one of the earliest and most intelligent ship masters" but "all the world loves a lover," and I started to tell you chiefly about his love affair.