On a moonlight night Flood Ireson was roused by knocking at his door
- Date of account
- Published 1896
- Source
- Myths and Legends of Our Own Land — Complete
- Reference
- Myths and Legends of Our Own Land — Complete · selected passage 105
- Rights
- public_domain
- Language
- English
- Record updated
- 2026-08-24
Record summary
On a moonlight night Flood Ireson was roused by knocking at his door
Published source text
Read the available text below. Archive transcriptions may contain OCR errors; later context is labelled separately. A recorded claim is not a finding that it happened.
Source passage
Source text · mention onlyOn a moonlight night Flood Ireson was roused by knocking at his door. On opening it he was seized by a band of his townsmen, silently hustled to a deserted spot, stripped, bound, and coated with tar and feathers. At break of day he was pitched into an old dory and dragged along the roads until the bottom of the boat dropped out, when he was mounted in a cart and the procession continued until Salem was reached. The selectmen of that town turned back the company, and for a part of the way home the cart was drawn by a jeering crowd of fishwives. Ireson was released only when nature had been taxed to the limit of endurance. As his bonds were cut he said, quietly, “I thank you for my ride, gentlemen, but you will live to regret it.”
Historical context
Contextual commentary · mention onlyThis material belongs to a folklore tradition. Story type, collector, community, transmission and literary editing matter when comparing it with other sources.
Modern context
Contextual commentary · mention onlyLattice compares motifs and reported features without assuming that a traditional being is a biological species or that similar stories document one external cause.
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