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“History is funnier than you think.” – P.D.
My full name is Pritchard Olin Jambalaya Daviess. Pritchard was my aunt’s idea. Olin was a mistake. Jambalaya was my mother’s pregnancy craving. And Daviess—I’ve got no idea where that came from. I was told as a child that my ancestors were once involved in a sordid cult, so perhaps that had something to do with it.
I was born, as were all of my seventeen siblings and cats, in the town of Rinky-Dink. As its name suggests, Rinky-Dink was so named because, during the coldest weeks of winter, the small pond in the center of town becomes a tiny ice rink. Rinky-Dink is in that weird unconnected part of Massachusetts next to New Hampshire. Whaling is the town’s sole industry—and minting counterfeit currency, but that’s a little hush hush. The entire colonial economy would have collapsed if not for my father’s dedication to our family’s business. You may know that sperm whale oil is collected in the holds of whaling ships until returning to port, but the real key—the true hero of the operation—is the Daviess Cork hammered into place by a burly seaman, sealing the barrel. There isn’t a whaling ship in the North Atlantic that doesn’t use my family’s corks. You might think such notoriety and our near monopoly would’ve made my family rich. Sadly, corks are inexpensive to mass produce, and my family has teetered on the edge of poverty my entire life.
My childhood was full of the usual adventures, friendships, and emotional insecurities. When very young, my brains were hopelessly addled in an unfortunate mishap. I have no memory of the event, but one day Paps and Mum noticed something different about me and sent for the finest—and only—doctor our geographic locale had to offer. The doctor did all he could, leeching at least one gallon of blood over the course of my early years, but I’m proud to relate that I beat the odds and completed one year of primary school. No one has ever been able to quash or dull my happy-go-lucky spirit. Trust me. People have tried over the years to no effect.
When I wasn’t working alongside my siblings and cats in the cork factory, I spent every free moment fishing, swimming, and trying in vain to create my very own musical instrument. But, in those early years, there was never much time for leisure. For hours each day, I worked in the cork factory—a windowless and roofless abandoned shack our family’s business had squatted in for decades. Time flew by as I stood alongside my siblings and cats day after day putting breadcrumbs on our family’s wobbly table.
Several branches of the Daviess clan lived in the Rinky-Dink metropolitan district. My childhood buddies included dozens of cousins, step-cousins, and neighbor’s cousins. We were all fast friends, but I’ll admit that in a footrace, I was usually the slowest of the bunch. Two friendships made during those formative years lasted well into adulthood. My step-second cousin, Ann Baldwin, was a kind girl who had a funny way of talking. For as long as I can remember, she talked with her head cocked to the side, speaking through a small crack in her pursed lips. Mum told me she’d been kicked by a horse, but I just thought of her as an eccentric. She was pretty, and her popularity allowed me to break the class ceiling that would have otherwise hindered my social advancement as a child.
One of Ann’s best friends was a grumpy, troubled boy named Samuel Chase. He was a real downer and prone to fits of ill temper, but Sammy soon became one of my closest friends and confidantes. He was always so happy to see me that, when he saw me coming, he’d run and run as I pursued him to help me get some exercise. Most friends aren’t as considerate and wellness-focused as Sammy was. With that said, Sammy was always a rather boring, ordinary sort. He and I weren’t cut from the same cloth if you catch my drift. He was shorn from some stained burlap, while I, Po J. Daviess, was snipped from fine lace.
When I was ten or eleven—I forget which—Sammy and his family moved to Maryland. Ann’s family followed not long after. Those months were some of the most difficult in my life, and not merely because I’d foolishly attempted to return to school to finish second grade. At the time, a tiny, wispy cloud had formed in the corner of the otherwise sunny and clear horizon which was my psyche. It didn’t stay long. The addling gave me an indescribable mechanism of coping with the ups and downs of life. You may be wondering how I learned to read and write after receiving practically no schooling. I have Ann to thank for that. She hooked me up with a fantastic tutor.
Sammy and Ann’s families both had substantial wealth when compared to my own, allowing them sufficient mobility to relocate across the colonies to Annapolis, Maryland. When they were both still young and beautiful, Ann and Sammy got hitched. Due to the great distance, my family wasn’t able to make the trek to attend the wedding and subsequent raucous partying. We sent along enough corks to supply a large winery as a present.
I had several romantic attachments myself in my younger years. Most of those relationships had difficulty getting off the ground. All of the girls in Rinky-Dink expected their dates to lead them through grueling choreographed dance numbers. The hit dance move of the day involved picking up your date and lifting them above your head. My limited upper body strength left me unable to oblige. It’s hard to court someone who won’t return your calling cards, especially when your failed dance move sent them tumbling into a cistern. At the age of twelve, after several failed courtships, the bachelor life chose me.
In the intervening years, I grew taller, and my voice got substantially higher. My hair hung unshorn in shaggy locks about my head. If I didn’t want to look especially fabulous, I had no need to wear a hat. While I was still employed by Paps, I’d moved at the age of fourteen to a little house of my own. In those days, homeowners named their estates to give them an air of familiar pomposity. I settled on Midge Meadow for mine.
After Sammy and Ann moved away, I wrote them almost every day, barring holidays and when I didn’t feel like it. Sammy’s lawyer and I became faithful pen pals over the years. Goodness, his daughters probably have lawyers of their own by now. Late in 1773, Sammy was so humbled by a series of personal successes that he tried to restrain me from visiting him, but I wouldn’t hear of it. “You’re my cousin,” I’d written him, “And I can’t stand us being apart.”
In the summer of 1774, I began to form a plan to visit my relatives. I’d say I saved for the trip, but I hadn’t. I find that it’s always safer and less expensive to travel with as little cash weighing you down as possible. My trip, at first glance, might sound like a simple family visit with no lasting, historical impact. However, my life and the fate of the colonies were forever changed—all because I woke up one morning with a pressing desire to delay my trip no longer.
