about it?” Mister Haskins questioned with a tilt of his head and a twinkle in his eyes.
Jonathan moved quickly out of his chair and rushed in excitement to embrace Mary. He picked her up as effortlessly as if she were a feather, then spun her around and around.
“Mary, can you believe I’ve—I mean we have employment. Can you believe it?”
“Jonathan let me down this minute so you can shake this gentleman’s hand,” exclaimed Mary.
Shaking hands in Ireland was the way men always sealed an agreement. Jonathan reached eagerly for Mister Haskin’s hand as Mary thanked him and Jonathan accepted Mister Haskin as his employer.
The year was 1807. Jonathan enjoyed working for Mister Haskins, and he slowly began to prosper. It seemed this new country was everything a hard-working young couple could ever want. They soon repaid their debt, made a down payment on a house, and Jonathan was prepared to offer Mister Haskins a bid to buy into the business.
One afternoon when Jonathan came in from work, he found an arrangement of flowers attached to the front doorknob. Entering the house cautiously, he found Mary waiting for him in the hall with a most unusual, but pleasant expression on her face.
“Mary, what is the occasion for the flowers? I’ve never received this kind of welcome.?”
“Sit down my love—we have plans to make,” Mary said, as she led him to his favorite chair.
“All right Mary, what is it?”
She placed her hands in his and softly whispered, “There is another Wilson on the way.”
Jonathan was flushed with excitement as they began to prepare for the welcomed addition. The first son, Lott, was born in the fall of 1808, and two years later, a second son whom they named Jeremiah.
Life, in general, had been good to the Wilsons, but in the winter of 1812, a massive epidemic of influenza struck the city claiming over three hundred lives. One was Jonathan Wilson. The death of Jonathan was devastating to Mary and her two young boys.
Mister Haskins did all he could to help the Wilsons, but the war with England had made it impossible for him to remain in Savannah. During the past revolution, he had sided with the colonist in their struggle to separate from the Mother Country and once the British had seized Savannah, his newspaper articles had endangered his life. He had been beaten twice by a group of Loyalists, his shop had been almost destroyed, and the safety of his family had been threatened on several occasions. He felt he was too old to go through this kind of ordeal again.
Mister Haskins knew he must warn Mrs. Wilson about the danger that existed for him and his wife if they remained in Savannah. Mary had been working in his business since Jonathan had died and always helped him clean up the shop each afternoon before closing. Telling her he was leaving Savannah was no easy task, and day after day, he procrastinated until he knew he could wait no longer.
One afternoon as they were about to close for the day, he knew he could put it off no longer. “Mary, I’ve got something to tell you, and I don’t know exactly how to begin.”
Mary quietly stopped her cleaning and sat down. “Mister Haskins, just tell me what’s on your mind,” replied Mary. Tm a good listener.”
“Mary, I must leave Savannah. If the British take the city, my life could be in danger.”
Then he told her his dilemma and that since his business would be closed, she would be without a job.
“Mister Haskins, what am I going to do?” she breathed, as she slowly stood with fingertips on her temples and the palms of her hands over her eyes. Then she ran her fingers backwards through her unbounded hair and said, “How will I support my boys?”
Mister Haskins reached for Mary’s hand and gently held her. “Mary, you can go with Mrs. Haskins and me to the Carolinas where my oldest son lives. We’ll take care of you.”
“Thank you, Mister Haskins, but I can’t do that. You have your own family to support. We would be just an extra burden to you. I’ll trust the Almighty God to take care of us.”
Mary was eventually forced to give up their comfortable home and move to an apartment near the Savannah River docks, a section far from respectable. To support her family, she worked during the day at a textile mill; and during the evenings, she was employed to cook and help maintain a kitchen in one of the local taverns located on River Street. Even though the food was the best in the neighborhood, the establishment often became a roughhouse late at night.
Meanwhile, the years passed quickly, and the family managed. Mary kept her job in the tavern and even found satisfaction in cooking there.
One day, a rare surge of cold weather dropped the temperature below freezing, but the kitchen of the High Step Tavern, was warm and comfortable. The tavern was called the High Step Tavern because of the steep steps that led up to the front door off the main street. These steps were an immense hazard to the intoxicated.
This day, Mary stood over the woodstove stirring some of her savory stew listening to the murmurings of people enjoying their meals, but with each passing minute the restaurant’s patrons became more lively and boisterous.
“Mrs. Wilson, we need four more servings right away!” shouted Ed Jenkins, the tavern’s owner. “People are waitin’ and are hungry!”
“It’s about ready, Ed. Be patient,” exclaimed Mary.
Lott, Mary’s oldest son and now a young man, was sitting near the wood box laboring over his schoolwork. Hearing Mister Jenkin’s tone of voice, he slammed his book to the floor in anger and hurled his pen at the door barely missing Mister Jenkins.
“Mother, how can you stand to put up with these people and their rude behavior? I hate this place. Why don’t you quit this filthy work? We don’t need the money that much.”
His mother stopped what she was doing, carefully placed her stirring spoon down, and angrily addressed Lott, “Young man, we do need this job if we are going to survive. Without the money I take in, you ladies couldn’t stay in school. I don’t want to hear any more about it. You just keep studying.”
She turned quickly from Lott and looked around the kitchen. “Where is your younger brother? He is supposed to be doing his work, too.”
“Mother, you know Jeremiah doesn’t like to do schoolwork. He hates school. He’s probably in the big room entertaining the men. They like to tease him and make him do silly things. He likes all that rough house and racket in there. His language is getting as profane as theirs. Some of them men think it’s funny to hear him cuss.”
“Son, you go get him out of there right now and make him do his work. I don’t want him in there with that crowd. You keep him out!” ordered Mary as she returned her attention to getting the food ready.
“Yes ma’am. I can get him back in here, but I can’t make him learn,” Lott said, as he stomped toward the door in defiance and, in a few moments, returned dragging Jeremiah by the collar.
Once again, Mary stopped what she was doing to address her boys, “Jeremiah, I don’t like for you to be around those men when they are drinking, and I don’t want you in there. You hear me, young man? And that cursing has got to stop.”
Jeremiah
