AUGUSTUS
WRIGHT
A
NANTICOKE GENTLEMAN
BEAVER
DAM'S CHAPEL POND
Gussie
Wright kept the peace between the “ little fellers “ that
build
the dams which threaten to flood nearby Sussex farmers land
and
those land owner and farmers of Indian River Hundred.
Gussie
is an old man of Nanticoke Indian ancestry.
Old
Gussie Wright knows the effects of nature and is quietly
engaged
in
keeping man and nature in balance between the farmers and the
beavers
around Chapel Pond . Gus takes pride that the pond, after near
a
century of absence, is back again with it's pine woods, a nursery
for
wood
ducks, is next door to ancient St. George's Chapel that has stood
by
since 1794 on the site of an 1718 Anglican chapel.
Speeding
by on the Robinsonville – Fairmount road one might miss
Chapel
Pond for looking at the old brick chapel. The pond doesn’t
look
like a pond because of the growth of swamp maples yet to be drowned
out
by high water but the old mill dam and the new beaver dam can be
seen
from
the roadway.
With
affectionate care Gus Wright has cleared underbrush but leaving
the
cedars, hollies and oaks as decorations. Out of a split log
he has
made
a swinging footbridge over the spillway.
Chapel
Pond grist mill was probably owned and operated by both the
Burton
family and the Robinson family. It has been gone a century or more
after
the mill dam gave way during a nor'east storm and was not repaired,
leaving
the pond to become a swamp with only a trickle of water flowing
through
it.
In
the early 1930's the Delaware Game & Fish Commission set out a
few
pair
of beaver in southeastern Sussex with hope they would survive
and
multiply
to replace the extinct native beavers. The newcomers made
themselves
at home along the heads of Guinea creek and Herring creek.
Beaver
dams have been destroyed by farmers when the little engineers
have
flooded adjacent lands. The Delaware Highway Department has
problems
keeping drainage culverts clear of beaver built obstructions.
Several
years ago, Gus Wright, who has the farm that adjoins Chapel
Pond,
noticed each morning fresh cut swamp maple saplings placed
neatly
into the break of the old dam. Week after week this “repairing”
took
place, layer upon layer of sticks and branches and black muck
were
embedded
in the rising dam. The water began to rise behind the dam.
Then
came the complaints and threats to tear the whole thing out.
But
Gus
had other ideas, he would keep both the beavers and farmer happy
by
regulating the water level all by himself. He did so by
removing
the
beavers work, however the beaver had other ideas and brought twice
the
amount to top our the dam almost every night. Gus had to go and
pull
out
each nights work every morning. Near by was his prof , a four
foot
high
pile of maples sticks which he would burn . Gussie took great
pride
in
maintaining the delicate balance between farmers and the beavers.
He
thought
a pond with beavers. Summer duck and other living wild things
was
good to have around. Gus would show visitors the old dam and it's
repair,
the six inch white oak trees the beavers had felled, the ruins of
the
old grist mill.
Augustus
Wright, age 84, a Indian River Hundred farmer at Chapel
Pond,
died July 5 1963 in Beebe Hospital, Lewes, and is buried at
Indian
Mission Church. He is survived by a daughter Mrs. Cornelia
Duplessis
of Philadelphia. His death has made a difference to the many
people
who knew him. What will happen to the little shady park, Beaver
Falls,
at Chapel Pond ? Will the Sussex woods reclaim the pond, the
benches
he built of 'twigs' for people to watch the beavers build their
lodge
and swim about, the paths and transplanted
hollies.
He was proud of his Nanticoke ancestry. On the 9th of
May 1925 he
married Laura Cerney. One account has his parents as Return Wright
and
Charlotte Johnson Wright, both born in 1850. His wife Laura was
born
1888 and died 1953.
Abstract:
Wilmington Morning News, January28, 947, by Anthony Higgins.
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