Pale as the Moon

When I was a child I was fascinated by stories about early explorers and pioneers of America. I was even more intrigued by stories about Native Americans. My obsession was probably first ignited by stories my Daddy told me that he heard from his father and grandfather. Growing up in the fifties and sixties the western genre was popular in TV shows and movies. By the time I was in the third grade I’d read everything our local library had, fiction and non-fiction, about Native Americans and the pioneer days.

While all this reading was going on I was growing up just an hour’s drive from the Outer Banks. My parents loved to fish, so we made frequent trips to the coast with that purpose. I became more infatuated with the history of the area as I grew older.

I was an adult before I made a career of horses. I had already raised three children when the opportunity came for me to enroll in the equine tech program at Martin Community College.

So, it is only natural that I combined those three loves: Native American history, the Outer Banks and Horses, when I wrote Pale as the Moon. Gray Squirrel and Heita Hoonoch are childhood playmates put in a different setting and time, but close friends all the same.

I didn’t know we had wild horses on the Outer Banks until much later in life. I hadn’t even given it much thought that people fished and lived on North Carolina’s coast eons before a white man ever set foot on our shore. I guess I learned that in elementary school when we were taught North Carolina History. It was reinforced the first time I saw the outdoor drama, “The Lost Colony.”

Forty some years later while reading Daniel Barefoot’s Touring the Backroads of north Carolina’s Upper Coast I came across a tidbit of information on page 140 that gave Pale as the Moon its conclusion. As far as I am concerned it is the logical answer to the Lost Colony mystery. In 1956, while I was voraciously reading books about Indians, artifacts of English and Native American culture were discovered near East Lake in a common mound. Forever lost to future investigation in the name of progress, the mound was covered back up and the canal digging carried on. I believe the English colony moved in with a lakeside village, but how did they find it? Someone showed them the way. Why not a young Native American girl who had become close friends with one of the English families?

So, a young Native American girl befriends a wild colt. Together, led by a series of dreams and empowered by the speed and stamina of the horse, she rescues a motley crew of English invaders. Along the way she rides like the wind with the sea spray on her face and the sea gulls laughing with glee. What an adventure, to be the first American to ride a horse. What an adventure to meet a boy her own age who sailed to America from across the vast Atlantic Ocean. Who better than a young child to realize the need for peace between two peoples whose cultures were so different.

I like to picture a much younger version of myself on vacation with her family at the Outer Banks. She sits on the cottage porch in a wooden chair, big enough to curl up in, with a book that will transport her back into a different century. She hears the whinny of a lost foal through the roar of gale force winds. She sees a vision of white sails when she glances up from her book to look across the breakers. Between the screeches of sea gulls she hears the soft voice of a Paspatank girl, just about her age. She turns the pages and joins in the celebration of the corn dance. She dreams. Her heart races with anticipation as Heita Hoonoch stretches his neck to take the ear of corn from her lap. She smells the sun and sea in his mane.

More pages turn, more adventures await. She IS Gray Squirrel. She knows the secret of the Lost Colony.

Order the book at Faithful Publishing

Searching for Marsh Tackies

Searching For the Marsh Tacky

Deborah knew where they were. I was visiting my daughter in South Carolina, where I have developed a deep interest in my State’s wild horses. Now, I wanted to see South Carolina’s wild horses, known locally as marsh tackies.

She drove us down long back roads, lined with trees that dripped Spanish moss. Finally we reached her destination, a private road on one of the many islands in Beaufort County. At the end of the road a barbed wire fence ran between the marsh and the road.

Not a horse in sight anywhere. We pondered the idea of pulling in someone’s driveway to ask. But none were “inviting.” So we turned around to leave. That’s when we saw a gentleman walking some dogs.

Deborah stopped along side of him to inquire about the wild horses.

“They don’t exist,” he replied, “And we’re all friends down here, so if we catch anyone trespassing we stick together.” Nope, not inviting at all. Deborah’s smile warmed him a little. He told us that one had gotten mired down in the marsh a while back. It took a community effort to rescue the horses, which then made the news. With that came activists who were upset the horse was “allowed” to wander in the muddy marsh. “They aren’t owned by anyone,” he said in a no-nonsense tone.

“Do you know anywhere else we might find some to photograph,” I asked, and explained I was a writer working on a book about east coast wild horses. That’s when he told us all about the man who had a hundred of them and loved to talk about them and show them off. “The paper ran a story about them just a while back.”

Encouraged by that information we went home and looked the article up on The Beaufort Gazette’s website. Next day, armed with the name, DP Lowther, we drove to Ridgeland, SC. It wasn’t easy finding Mr. Lowther’s farm since the road sign had been stolen, but after asking directions twice we were successful. Mr. Lowther wasn’t around, but a farm worker gave us permission to go look and take pictures.

Mr. Lowther, according to the Gazette article, breeds and sells the Marsh Tackies. His 250-acre farm provides them plenty of roaming room. The horses varied in color and range in size from about 14 to 15 hands. While chestnuts were the dominate color, I spied a beautiful little dun that after inspiring a certain amount of curiosity on his part got close enough to the fence for me to snap some photos. Roans, blacks and one gray also stood out in the pasture.

After taking two rolls of film we went back to thank the gentleman for letting us see the horses. He took time to tell us an amusing story. He said it was a July 4th weekend that the stallion, who was up in the barn for the night, unlocked his stall door, trotted down the lane to a pasture where fifty mares were kept, tore down the fence, herded up his girls and took them down the road and into town.

“The mare’s weren’t that hard to catch, but the stallion hid in the woods for a few days before I found him.” The farmer chuckled. Evidently the little stallion was tired of the game, because he let himself be led home with only a lead rope wrapped around his neck.

I took one last glance at the pastoral scene. The descendants of horses ridden by colonial explorers, bred by English farmers to plow, ride and drive. In the 1950s when automobiles and bridges to South Carolina’s islands made the horses obsolete some horses were simply turned loose to fend for themselves. They ran wild for a few more years, and then were gradually pushed aside for development and progress. If it were not for a handful of people like Mr. Lowther, who saw a reason to preserve this part of Low Country heritage, they would all be gone.