American Phoenix by Sarah S. Kilborne

Author:Sarah S. Kilborne
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Free Press

Chapter Eleven

Five days after the flood, on Thursday, May 21, volunteer laborers arrived in Skinnerville for the first time—more than 150 men from the Boston & Albany Railroad. When they appeared in front of the Skinner mansion in the rain, Will and Fred began to direct a number of them in cleaning out the cellar. In the meantime others started to clear away the snarl of matter that still ringed the house like a choker, while more fanned out across the meadows to help clear debris around the wrecks still standing. Despite the miserable weather—the rain was much heavier than earlier in the week—the railroad men did an impressive job, “ considerably improving the appearance in [Skinnerville].”

Skinner spent the morning in Northampton with an old friend in the silk trade named Hovey, on what was certainly a business trip to look at potential sites. Hovey was from out of town, had no allegiance to Northampton, and his visit had an unexpected result. By Thursday’s end the likelihood of moving to Northampton had faded, with people speculating that Skinner was more attached to staying in Skinnerville than he’d previously conveyed. This positive impression was further impacted by the improvement to Skinner’s house by the railroad men, their work revealing that the building wasn’t as compromised as it had seemed.

“Mr. Skinner has a natural pride in re-establishing himself in the village which he once built up,” wrote a Springfield Republican reporter enthusiastically, “his old neighbors and friends are most anxious for him to stay, his fine residence after the necessary repairs will furnish a new tie to bind him to the spot, and, with the capital he needs at his command there is everything to encourage him in a determination to stay.” Furthermore a closer survey of the land damages that afternoon suggested that they were not as insurmountable as Skinner had initially thought. “The great obstacle has, hitherto, been the apparent impossibility of utilizing the water privilege,” the reporter went on, “. . . but thorough investigation by careful men leads to the belief that this difficulty is not insuperable. There is thus, it will be seen, good reason for believing that Skinner’s case is by no means so hopeless as it has seemed.”

As night wore on, however, only those as far away as Springfield were able to think about such things as the future. Those in the valley were once again trapped in the present. The rain came down in sheets, as it had been doing for much of the day, raising the level of the river as well as the water in the two reservoirs up in Goshen. Villagers in Skinnerville huddled together up near the railroad tracks, under trees and blankets, fearing another flood. “More than half the people living on the route of the river left their houses,” reported one local, “and retired to safer quarters on higher ground.” To the north, men were stationed along the road to Goshen at half-mile intervals with ready-bridled horses and loaded guns, with orders to fire at the first cause for alarm and break into a relay.

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