A PATRIOTIC WOMAN’S STORY: RHODA SMITH FARRAND

In the last of these Centennial days,
Let me sing a song to a woman’s praise;
How she proved herself in that time of strife
Worthy of being a patriot’s wife.
A little woman she was, not young,
But ready of wit and quiet of tongue;
One of the kind of which Solomon told,
Setting their price above rubies and gold.
A memory brave clings around her name,
“Twas Rhoda Farrand, and worthy of fame,
Though scarce she dreamed ‘twould be woven in rhymes
In these her grand-daughter’s daughter’s times.

Just out of the clamor of war’s alarms
Lay in tranquil quiet the Jersey farms
And all the produce in barn and shed
By the boys and girls was harvested.
For the winds of winter, with storm and chill,
Swept bitterly over each field and hill.
Her husband was with the army, and she
Was left on the farm at Parsippany,
When she heard the sound of a horse’s feet
And Marshall Doty rode up the street;
He paused but a moment, and then handed down
A letter for Rhoda, from Morristown,
In her husband’s hand – how she seized the sheet!

The children came running with eager feet, –
There were Nate and Betty, Hannah and Dan, –
To list to the letter’ and thus it ran,
After best greeting to children and wife:
“Heart of my heart, and life of my life,”
(I read from the paper, wrinkled and brown,)
“We are here for the winter, in Morristown,
And a sorry sight are our men to-day
In tatters and rags with no signs of pay.
As we marched to camp, if a man looked back,
By the dropping of blood he could trace our track;
For scarcely a man has a decent shoe,
And there’s not a stocking the army through;
So send us stockings as quick as you can,
My company needs them, every man,
And every man is a neighbor’s lad;
Tell this to their mothers, they need them bad.”

Then, if never before, beat Rhoda’s heart,
“Twas time to be doing a woman’s part.
She turned to her daughters, Hannah and Bet:
“Girls, each on your needles a stocking set;
Get my cloak and hood; as for you, son Dan,
Yoke up the steers as quick as you can;
Put a chair in the wagon, as you’re alive;
I will sit and knit, while you go and drive.”
They started at once on Whippany road,
She knitting away while he held the goad.
At Whippany village she stopped to call
On the sisters Prudence and Mary Ball.
She would not go in; she sat in her chair
And read to the girls her letter from there.
That was enough, for their brothers three
Were in Lieutenant Farrand’s company.

Then on Rhoda went, stopping here and there
To rouse the neighbors from her old chair.
Still while she was riding her needles flew,
And minute by minute the stocking grew.
Across the country so withered and brown,
They drove till they came to Hanover town.
There, mellow and rich, lay the Smith’s broad lands;
With them she took dinner and warmed her hands.
Next toward Hanover-Neck Dan turned the steers,
Where her cousins, the Kitchels, had lived for years.
With the Kitchels she supped, then homeward turned,
While above her the stars like lanterns burned;
And she stepped from her chair, helped by her son,
With her first day’s work and her stockings done.

On Rockaway river so bright and clear,
The brown leaf skims in the Fall of the year;
Around through the hills it curves like an arm,
And holds in its clasp more than one bright farm
Through Rockaway valley next day drove Dan;
Boy though he was, he worked like a man.
His mother behind him sat in her her chair,
Still knitting, but knitting another pair.
They roused the valley, then drove through the gorge,
And stopped for a minute at Compton’s forge;
Then on to Boonton, and there they were fed,
While the letter was passed around and read.
“Knit,” said Rhoda to all, “as fast as you can;
Send the stockings to me; and my son Dan,
The first of next week, will drive me down,
And I’ll take the stockings to Morristown.”
Then from Boonton home, and at set of sun
She entered her house with her stockings done.

On Thursday, they knit from morn till night,
She and the girls, with all their might.
When the yarn gave out, they carded and spun,
And every day more stockings were done.
When the wool was gone, then they killed a sheep –
A cosset – but nobody stopped to weep,
They pulled the fleece and they carded away,
And spun and knitted from night until day.
In all the country no woman could rest,
But they knitted on like people possessed;
And Parson Condit expounded his views
On the Sabbath day unto empty pews,
Except for a few stray lads who came
And sat in the gallery, to save the name.

On Monday morn, at an early hour
The stockings came in – a perfect shower –
A shower that lasted until the night;
Black, brown and gray ones, and mixed blue and white.
There were pairs one hundred and thirty-three,
Long ones, remember, up to the knee;
And the next day Rhoda carried them down
In the old ox-wagon to Morristown.

I hear, like an echo, the soldiers’ cheers
For Rhoda and Dan, the wagon and steers,
Growing wilder yet for the chief in command;
While up at “salute” to the brow flies the hand,
As Washington passes, desiring them
To thank Mistress Farrand in the name of his men.
But the words that her husband’s lips let fall
“I knew you would do it!” were best of all.
And I think in these Centennial days
That she should be given her meed of praise;
And while we are singing of ‘Auld Lang Syne.’
Her name, with the others, deserves to shine.