Foster's

Culverton House .1

A/N: For all of the "Culverton House" the chapters, except for the last one, they should be read like Town Gossip. These are all stories that the town folk swap amongst each other. Hence the minimal descriptions. Hope you still enjoy!

1863

It was a sunny afternoon the day the Confederates road up upon the Culverton house with nothing but ill intent in their minds and it was a dark and stormy night by the time they left.

And they left behind nothing but death.

The Jackson family was a well known white-family in Fort Talesas. They flew Confederate flags from their flag posts, donated money whenever they could, had two sons out on the front lines fighting for them and spoke the literature from memory. But their neighbours had reason to believe that they were sympathizers with the Union and even worse the Slaves.

Several slaves had gone missing from many of the plantations around the area, and all of them seemed to disappear crossing over onto the Jackson's land.

Oh they would help the owners search but no one would ever find anything.

Honestly, at this point their neighbours were certain that the Culverton House was a stop on the Underground Railroad, and if that was true well... it just couldn't stand.

They had no proof, no real proof of course, but that didn't stop them from whispering their suspicions into the ears of the right people. And soon those whispers stopped being rumors and started being something else entirely.

And by then it was too late to stop it.

George Jackson, the Patriarch of the family, stood up against the soldiers that rode onto the plantation. He had opened the doors to them happily, as if he were greeting old friends. They had the family rounded up and separated.

Females. Males. Children. Slaves. All of them in separate groups.

They questioned George Jackson about the rumors they had heard. He had clever lies to hand them, but even if they were truths they didn't believe them.

In their minds the whole family was already guilty and that wasn't going to change no matter what they were told.

The whole affair took the whole night.

The women white and black were taken into the house to entertain the men. The house was raided for its valuables and food. The male slaves that looked strong were taken as stock, the rest were hung then and there.

When they were done with the women, the slaves were hung with the other and the family was lined up for their final execution.

To be hanged like the black people they so loved.

They hung them all from the branches of the White Willow Tree that they were constantly bragging about. Brought straight from some little Slavic country in Europe, they had proudly told everyone. They had been worried it wouldn't survive in Texan soil but that tree had flourished.

And it was their bodies that decorated the massive weeping branches that night.

One boy, their serving boy, was hung with them. They let him hold his teddy in his bound hands, and he clutched that little crudely made Teddy until his legs stopped twitching and his face went blue. They knew he was dead when he dropped it, and then they could finally leave.

In a few days time, when the birds had picked their fill from the bodies, the neighbours came and cut them down. If only to get rid of the godawful smell that was wafting from plantation.

The family was buried in the church, there was no ceremony, they weren't even buried in coffins. They were all dumped in the same grave, and all shared one tombstone.

They all swore to never speak of them again but no one ever did prove if the Jackson Family was actually on the railroad and the truth of if they were or not wouldn't be known until well after the war.

The secret, it seemed, had died with them.

And for a long time the house stood silent and foreboding, as if it was guarding the secret itself.