From The Connecticut River Valley in Southern Vermont and New Hampshire: Historical Sketches by Lyman S. Hayes, Tuttle Co., Marble City Press, Rutland, VT., 1929, page 248:
FOURTH OF JULY PRANKS IN EARLY TIMES NEAR BELLOWS FALLS
If records and traditions are correct, the "Young America" of the present generation, in all this vicinity, is not up to that of a century or so ago in its shrewddness and real humor in the annual celebrations of the Fourth of July. It used to be an ingenious practice in this section of the Connecticut river valley to steal the few cannon then in use, and held as public property by the different villages, for such celebrations, if they could not be borrowed. Sometimes, in addition to its being a contest of wits between different villages in Vermont, the strife was extended across the river to rivalry beetween the different villages of the two states, thus materially increasing the interest in the result of victory. The strife was not confined to the boys but was a part of the annual fun of more mature ages.
One year, while the village of Rockingham was the most populous one in this township, the celebration of the year before had left the possession of the town cannon with them, and the Bellows Falls men wanted it. They were denied it, and it was a great mystery where it was stored. These two villages were each anxious for the field piece, that it might be first heard on the morning of Independence Day from their locality, and this would be considered as a much prized victory. Bellows Falls heard the report that the much wanted piece of artillery was under a certain pile of lumber in the tannery yard of Manessah Divoll, where citizens of Rockingham village had hidden it. A large party was made up and after dark, the night of the 3rd, marched up the four [249] miles to capture it. They took along a team to bring it back, but the whole village was hunted over without findding it. Captain Walter Taylor, who was always promiinent in such pranks, told the boys all to hide and he would see if he could find it by strategy. He aroused Samuel L. Billings, then town clerk, who, he thought, would know where it was hidden. He came to his door very sleepily and was told by the Captain that he underrstood that the Saxtons River boys had taken their cannon. His sleepiness disappeared quickly as he said, "Hold on a minute and I will get my lantern and see."
They went down to the tannery and, finding a shovel, scraped off the dirt from two movable planks of the floor, and raising them were gratified to find the field-piece, nestling where it had been hidden. He remarked he "was glad it was there, " which sentiment was echoed by the Captain, and after the town clerk had retired the much coveted prize was loaded into the wagon and taken to Bellows Falls, where it was the "first gun" of the next day's celebration.
The same year the Westminster boys stole the cannnon from Walpole, but, as soon as its voice was heard and the New Hampshire boys knew where it was, they rallied in so large numbers as to be able to take it by force. The rally force was under command of old Captain Sparhawk, a prominent resident of Walpole in his day. Such incidents occurred each year, and there was considerable rivalry to see which locality would use the most cunning or force, and secure the use of guns, which were limited in number in all this locality. No Fourth of July celebration was considered complete without a [250] goodly-sized cannon to make such noise as is now seldom heard.
One Fourth of July some of the boys were celebrating at a very early hour in the morning, having a good-sized cannon which they were causing to "talk" in front of Mammoth block on the south side of the Square in Belllows Falls, in front of the present clothing store of J. J. Fenton & Co. The patrons of the "Bellows Falls Stage House, " across the Square, being unable to sleep, were many of them sauntering about the house. A guest of the house, who had been lying on an old-fashioned hair-cloth sofa in the" sitting-room, " on the south side, had just risen and sauntered out to the piazza. He stood leaning against the second pillar from the east when the boys, in their excitement, forgetting to remove the iron ramrod from the cannon, fired it toward the hotel. The ramrod passed between the post and the guest, through the side of the building into the sitting room, lengthwise through the lounge from which the guest had just arisen, and buried itself in the opposite wall of the room without doing further damage.