Richmond Press, Inc.                          Richmond, VA                          1938

The Clyde Row Gang

And then there was the old Clyde Row Gang-O Boy!

We had a beautiful field that lay behind the row of houses where some of us dwelt; and to that field repaired boys from many adjacent quarters, there to play baseball, bandy, roly-poly, tag, foot-and-a-half, cutting-grass, I-spy, prisoner's base and all sorts of delightful games known to the young gentry of those rose-tinted days, but unknown to the lads of these later, paler, mechanical times, poor things!

We can give from memory the names of the families who then lived in the row of sixteen houses, called Clyde Place, God bless you!  It was located on the south side of Cary Street between Adams and Jefferson, an was numbered from 101 to 131 West Cary.  Here are the names: Tyler, Tyler, McGilvray, Paine, Gardner, Poyner, Wallace, Hutchinson, Hall, Wollard, Wallace, Blanton, Cooke, Crutchfield, Holand, Darden.  (We memorized them to a sing-song chant and never forget them.)

Many of those families had boys who played in the field behind the row.  They were nice people, all of them, and there was an air of refinement spread around.  But boys of all kinds came to play in that field and high old times were enjoyed.

Some of the boys were John and Fairlie Cooke, and their little brother, St. George.  The first time I ever saw him he was about five years old and in a fight.  He was always fighting, God bless his little heart!  Then there were Frank Jobson, Eddie Hutchinson, George and Sclater Wallace, John Baptist, Fred and Ves Tyler, Wilmer Paine, Jeff and Charlie Wallace, Jim Anderson, who was the swiftest of foot and the most muscular of all, Charlie Glinn and his big brother Percy, whom we called Piggy, Paul Bargamin and his little brother, Eddie Moore-we used to call him Eddie Nigger-Sam and Robert Pulliam, Bill Wilson-Brown Jacket was his boy-bestowed nomme de guerre -the redoubtable Juny Baker, Bill and Dick Berry, Lonnie Wilson, Leon Ruskell-Dutch, we called him-Martin Cooley-he came from Maine, a little red-headed cuss, the best natured boy of all whom everybody liked, Louis Gordon-we called him Big Gordon-Louis Lowry, Aleck Williams, Sam and Toofie Wortham, Billie Gibson-Little Billie, not the Big Billie-John Nowlin, Norman and Willie Binford, Wirt Potts, Howard Browning, Eddie Benson, Austin Smith, George McGilvray, Porter and Cooper Cox, Adam Johnson (the most athletic of all), Charlie Roach (still going strong), Willie Ball-we called him Bouncy Ball-Frank Winder, Bill Toler-Corkie Speelie, we called him; afterward a sergeant of police), Charlie and Bill Weiss, Dick Brazile and a boy who was always called by his full, dignified and grown-up name-John M. Jones.

There was also a boy, whose name we scarcely knew, and have now forgotten.  The first time he played with the gang, he had announced that he came from a doggone sight bigger city than Richmond.  Asked what city it was, he had replied, proudly: "Galveston, Texas"-with accent on the ves.  From that time on, he was known simply as Galveston.

There were some bigger boys who at times deigned to come and play in our field: John Baker, Walter Collins, Joe Wilson, George Burgess, Irving Knowles; he and Billie Berry, of a size, fought a classic fight; it went three hours, with honors easy, until neither could lift a hand nor draw his breath; so their friends interposed and told them they'd have to call it a draw; Deedle Frasier, Sam and Lee Ragland, Royall Powell, Tip Brazile and, most admired of all, Byrd Chamberlayne.  We called him Pud.  He was of extraordinary muscular development and outdid everybody in feats of strength; and did it so easily and gracefully that it was a marvel.  He was our hero; and whatever else may be said of him, this may be said to his credit: He was good to little boys.

Charlie Boy, previously mentioned, was quite friendly to the boys of the Clyde Row gang.  His name was Charles Robinson.  He was a tall, well-made darkey, with wide mouth and thick red lips.  He had a way of possessing odd things.  One day you might meet him, as he came along the street, carrying a new tin pan, but he would be carrying it on the tip of his index finger, twirling it and keeping it in balance.  "Oh, it's as clair as mud, but you can't see through it," he would say.  Another time, he might come by, carrying a bass viol as tall as himself; or, on a Christmas, he might have a brass-mounted, flintlock horse pistol, to fire blank charges, as his contribution to the general din.

Oh, what entrancing times in that old field!

Frank Jobson's father moved into the row when some other moved out.  He was an ex-Confederate soldier with a great bullet scar in his cheek.  Further down lived General John R. Cooke, who had a bullet scar in the middle of his forehead-which Heros von Borcke had admired-"John Cooke," he had said, "has the most beautiful scar in the world."

Well, those two scarred soldiers had two sons.  Frank Jobson, after he grew up, became an inventor of very practical things.  And once Fairlie Cooke, who was a strategist, as became the scion of a line of soldiers, egged him on to the execution of a plan, a scientific experiment he had in mind.  It was to take the old umbrella, hoist it, hold it firmly by the handle and jump off the top of the back porch.  Now, that back porch was three stories high, some twenty-eight of thirty feet.

"It can't fail," said Fairlie, spurring him on to glory.

So Frank jumped.  Alas, for science!  The mean old umbrella turned wrong-side out and Frank was in bed for two weeks.

We had a game, which we suppose no other boys every played, called "Devil in the Ditch."  At the foot of the slope that comes down from the Penitentiary wall and the R., F. & P. Connection track, near Canal Street, was a low, wide gully, the bottom of which was a flat sandy floor.  We used to sit on the low banks of a summer night and talk (about fighting and hunting and such like subjects-this was no paint and powder club, you see, unless it were war paint and a gun-powder).  In the middle of the gully was a small mound, a sort of scuffle-rock on dry land.

Now, upon that mound one boy, who straight-way became the Devil in the Ditch, would take his station and the others would try to entice him away from his base, when another would try to get on it before the old Devil got back; in which case, he became the new Devil; and so the game proceeded.

I do not know who invented the game, but Juny Baker was the most successful Devil of all (you might know).

Once the Clyde Row gang, or a small section of it, went to John Robinson's circus when it showed at Second and Leigh Streets.  We only had the price of admission to the side show; and we stayed a long time in the tent, to get our money's worth, and saw the show many times.  One feature was a Punch and Judy act.  After several performances, I solved the mystery of that act; and next day carved from soft white pine a set of characters.  I dressed them, using old calico scraps, and advertised a show in my basement, which opened on the level of the back yard.  One cent admission was charged.  Posters were put up at several corners, written out with an old mucilage brush and poke-berry ink: "Grand Punch and Judy Show in Charlie Wallace's Back Yard."

All the youngsters were there; some very little ones were admitted free, amongst them being Lonnie Wilson, and thereby hangs a tale.

The kids were astonished.  That one of their own number should be able to put on a show like that was amazing.  They thought I had some mysterious strings and wires behind the curtain. And Lonnie Wilson told me many years later that it first put the notion into his head to be an actor.  "If he can do it, I can do it," he said to himself; and forthwith began to study for the stage.