The Slave Kidnapper

Amongst the landscaped grounds of Woodburn are rows of shaped English boxwoods, evenly lined hedges, scattered crepe myrtle's and several tall pines. Towering above the rest of the trees in the mansion's spacious back yard, stands a tall tulip poplar, its thick branches reaching out like fingers of a gnarled hand toward the sky. At its wide base, the dark trunk is split, revealing hollows large enough for a man to stand inside.

On foggy nights, some say, you can see the ghost of a dead man hanging from the tree, rusty chains still grasped in his hands, rattling in the wind.

Much of this well-known and often repeated Kent County legend is based on the chapter entitled "The Cowgill House" in The Entailed Hat by George Alfred Townsend.

According to that author, Patty Cannon of Johnson's Crossroads near Reliance-the notorious murderess, thief and gang leader, who stole free and escaping slaves and sold them back into captivity-raided Woodburn to kidnap a group of slaves who had gathered in the basement for an evening of recreation.

When officials and Quaker owner Daniel Cowgill chased off the raiders, one would be slave napper hid in the branches and hollows of the large tulip poplar. Unfortunately, the fellow lost his hold and fell from his hiding place in the center of the tree. But the descending body never reached the ground, for the man's neck was caught between two intertwined limbs. It was there that the unlucky slave robber was strangled by the gnarled poplar's thick branches.

Some still refer to the tall tree, that stands in the governor's yard, as "The Hanging Tree." And that ghost is said to moan and rattle chains in that tree and in the cellar, near the tunnel entrance where the slaves were huddled during the raid.

A different version suggests a slave who was trying to escape a band of pursuers hid in the trunk of the tree, but was captured. Still another tale says the moans are the cries of slaves who were captured or killed in Woodburn.