Page:The Presidents of the United States, 1789-1914, v. II.djvu/190

 148 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS ment. After watching and waiting for an oppor tunity to obtain their freedom, their hour at length came. While Fillmore sent an axe crashing through the skull of Burrall, the boatswain, the captain and other officers were despatched by his companions, and the ship was won. They sailed her into Boston harbor, and the same court which condemned the brigands of the sea presented John Fillmore with the captain s silver-hilted sword and other articles, which are preserved to this day by his descendants. The sword was inherited by his son, Nathaniel, and was made good use of in both the French and Revolutionary wars. Lieut. Fill- more s second son, who also bore the name Nathaniel, and who was the father of the president, went with his young wife, Phebe Millard, to what at the close of the past century was the &quot;far west,&quot; where he and a younger brother built a log cabin in the wilderness, and there his second son, Millard, was born. Nathaniel Fillmore was one of &quot;God Almighty s gentlemen,&quot; whose creed was contained in two words, &quot;do right,&quot; and who lived to see his son elevated to the highest position in his native land. Of the president s mother, who died in the summer of 1831, little is known beyond the fact that she was a sensible and, in her later years, a sickly woman; with a sunny nature that enabled her to endure uncomplainingly the many hardships of a frontier life, and that her closing days were