THE SCYTHE TREE 



Submitted by Alva H. Pulver, Sodus, X. Y. 



THE tree is on the farm of Clarence Schaeffer, Seneca 

 County. In 1861, when he learned Fort Sumter had 

 been fired on, James Wyburn Johnson, of Waterloo, came 

 from the field bringing his scythe. He placed it in a small 

 Balm of Gilead tree near the house, with the remark, 

 " Leave the scythe in the tree until I return." He enlisted 

 in the union service. 



The parents of young Johnson for a time heard from their 

 boy and then a silence came, extending from month to month. 

 The war records show that the young man was mortally 

 wounded in North Carolina, dying in a hospital there, and 

 was buried in the South in 1864. In the years of the war 

 the scythe was left where it was placed in the tree. The 

 six-inch sapling grew about the blade of the scythe. It 

 finally held the scythe securely and the inroads of elements 

 loosened the handle which dropped away. At the present 

 time only about six inches of the blade protrudes from the 

 side of the tree. In the photo this may be seen on the right 

 side of the tree. Won $10. 



