{"id":468,"date":"2025-10-21T19:07:43","date_gmt":"2025-10-21T19:07:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/?p=468"},"modified":"2025-10-21T19:09:14","modified_gmt":"2025-10-21T19:09:14","slug":"fall-of-the-charter-oak","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/?p=468","title":{"rendered":"Fall of the Charter Oak"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sigourney wrote several poems in homage to the famous Connecticut tree known as the Charter Oak. This poem was written in the period of state-wide grief when the tree was struck by lightening and fell on August 21, 1856. Hartford even organized a funeral procession for the tree that drew crowds of mourners. The wood from the tree was harvested and turned into keepsakes that can still be viewed at places like the CT Museum of Culture and History and the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art. Charles De Wolf Brownell’s painting of 1857 is often on view at the Wadsworth, a spectacular homage to the tree whose frame is made from the Charter Oak’s wood. Read what Mark Twain had to say about the Charter Oak on his first visit to Hartford and to the Wadsworth in this anthology (see “Glimpse of Hartford”<\/a> under Samuel Clemens\/Mark Twain.) To learn what made this such an iconic tree and to see an image of Brownell’s painting, go to The Legend of the Charter Oak<\/a> on Connecticuthistory.org.<\/p>\n

Fall of the Charter Oak
\nby Lydia Huntley Sigourney<\/h4>\n

Woe,\u2014for the mighty Tree!
\nThe monarch of the plain,\u2014
\nThe storm hath reft its noble heart\u2014
\nIt ne’er shall tower again,
\nIn ruins, far and wide,
\nIts giant limbs are laid,
\nLike some fallen dynasty of earth,
\nWhose nod the nations sway’d.<\/p>\n

Woe, for the ancient Oak,
\nOur Pilgrim-fathers’ pride,
\nThat shook the centuries from its crown,
\nAnd flourish’d when they died;
\nThe grass-flower at its feet,
\nShall quickening Spring restore,
\nBut healthful dews, or nesting bird
\nRevisit it no more.<\/p>\n

The roaming Indian prized
\nIts canopy of shade,
\nAnd bless’d it while his council fire
\nIn eddying volumes play’d,
\nHe for its wisdom sought
\nAs to a Delphic shrine,
\nHe ask’d it when to plant his corn,
\nAnd waited for the\u00a0sign.<\/p>\n

You white haired man sits down
\nWhere its torn branches lie,
\nAnd tells the listening boy, the tale
\nOf threatened Liberty,
\nHow tyrant pomp and power,
\nOnce in the olden time,
\nCame Brennus-like, with iron tramp
\nTo crush our infant clime,<\/p>\n

And how that brave old Oak
\nStood forth, a friend indeed,
\nAnd spread its AEgis o’er our sires,
\nIn their extremest need,
\nAnd in its sacred breast
\nTheir germ of freedom bore,
\nAnd hid their life-blood in its veins,
\nUntil the blast was o’er.<\/p>\n

Throngs, gathering round the spot
\nTheir mournful memories weave,
\nEven children, in strange silence stand,
\nUnconscious why they grieve,
\nOr for their casket seek
\nSome relic spray to glean,
\nAcorn, or precious leaf, to press
\nTheir Bible-page between.<\/p>\n

Was there no other prey,
\nOh, Storm!\u2014that thunder’d by?
\nWreaking dark vengeance, ‘neath the shroud
\nOf the wild midnight sky?
\nWas there no kingly Elm,
\nMajestic, broad and free,
\nThat thou must, in thy madness, smite
\nOur tutelary tree?<\/p>\n

Our beacon of the past,
\nOur chronicler of time,
\nOur Mecca, to whose greenwood glade
\nCame feet from every clime?
\nHark!\u2014to the echoing dirge,
\nIn measures deep and slow,
\nWhile on the breeze our banner floats,
\nDraped in the weeds of woe.<\/p>\n

The fair ones of our vale
\nO’er its lost Guardian sigh,
\nAnd elders with prophetic dread
\nDark auguries descry,
\nPatriots and sages deign
\nO’er the loved wreck to bend,
\nAnd in this funeral of the Oak
\nLament their Country’s friend.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sigourney wrote several poems in homage to the famous Connecticut tree known as the Charter Oak. This poem was written in the period of state-wide grief when the tree was struck by lightening and fell on August 21, 1856. Hartford even organized a funeral procession for the tree that drew crowds of mourners. The wood … Continue reading Fall of the Charter Oak<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[78],"tags":[56,35,47,32,31],"class_list":["post-468","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-lydia-huntley-sigourney","tag-democracy","tag-hartford-history","tag-hartford-setting","tag-poem","tag-poetry"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/468","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=468"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/468\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=468"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=468"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=468"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}