The Barbadoes or Windward Islands have long been the territory of Great Britain and her colonies were planted there as early as on the main land of America.

Early in the eighteenth century dissatisfaction arose concerning taxes and other injustices, and some of these colonists removed to the continent, chiefly to Virginia and the Carolinas. Among these was Edmond Reid, with his family, landing at Norfolk, Virginia. He brought with him quite a number of slaves. These slaves were remarkable in many ways. They must have been part Carib; they had thin lips, straight noses and arched feet. They were erect and alert. Some of these slaves in the fourth generation came to my mother and were above the ordinary African and were so dark they evidently had no Caucasian blood.

John Reid, son of Edmond Reid, married Elizabeth Steppe, and served in the Revolution. James, the son of John and Elizabeth, was born during the Revolution, February 21st, 1778. Archery was a great sport in those days, handed down no doubt from our British ancestry and kept alive by the bows and arrows of the Indians, some of whom were still among the neighbors in the colonies. At twelve years of age James Reid was shooting arrows, and as an experiment shot one up straight toward the sky. Quickly it went up, but more quickly, with accelerated speed it returned and pierced the eye of the little archer. Painfully the arrow (in this case a pin point) was taken from the eye. Youth and a fine constitution combined to heal the wound without disfigurement of the eye, and so he seemed to have two perfect eyes, while one was sightless.

Our young Republic was just beginning to try her powers when England provoked the war of 1812. James Reid, now in the prime of manhood, enlisted when the British threatened New Orleans. As many others did, he left his wife and two little ones at home under the protection of slaves.

A few days after his return from the war, on a summer day, a pain came to the eye pierced so long ago by the arrow. The local physician was sent for, but his lotions and applications failed to give relief. At that time no surgeon, except those perhaps in France, understood surgery of the eye. So nature took her course, seemingly a cruel, dreadful course. The suffering man could neither sleep nor eat and finally could not stay in the house. He went out under the trees in the grove and when unable to stand rolled around on the grass in great agony. His wife and children and servants followed him with cold water and pillows—a sorrowing and helpless procession. After several days and nights the abscess in his eye bursted and gave instant relief. All the fluids of the eye escaped leaving it sightless and shrunken, and so it remained ever after. I never see a shrunken eye but what I recall the old man, so spirited, so cheery, so kind, our own grandfather who passed away many years ago—Mrs. R. H. Hardaway, Regent, Sarah Dickinson Chapter, D.A.R.