The One Horse Open Sleigh

THE ONE HORSE OPEN SLEIGH

By Christine E. Buck

What do Jingle Bells and Genegantslet have in common? The answer is a stretch, I admit, but stay with me; see if you agree.

The year is 1857. The song called The One Horse Open Sleigh is copyrighted and published as a choral arrangement. The cost for the music? Twenty-five cents, the price of a paper bound cookbook or a diary.

The song’s origin is myth-filled and controversial. Where it was written and for what venue really aren’t known. Cities in Massachusetts and Georgia each claim the song and composer as their own. Some contend it was written for a Thanksgiving Sunday School concert, and others believe it was too secular for that purpose—“racy” for its time.

This fact is commonly accepted: its author and composer was James Lord Pierpont, a native of Medford, MA. No one knows the year he wrote it, but at the time of publication, Pierpont was serving as organist and music director of the Universalist Church in Savannah, GA. In 1859, two years after the song’s debut, the publisher revised the cover and reprinted the sheet music as Jingle Bells, or the One Horse Open Sleigh.

In the Town of Greene in that year of 1857, Daniel D. Bradley, youngest of six children, was a twenty-nine year old bachelor farmer. He lived with his parents near Genegantslet. The farmhouse, built by his father about 1811, was on today’s Genegantslet Road (County Route 2), seven-tenths of a mile north of the Route 206 intersection. Now collapsed into its cellar, some may remember the old green farmhouse sitting on a rise between the Boeltz and Beckwith farms. The barn behind the house still stands. Daniel Bradley’s grandparents on both sides were early settlers of Greene—the Stephen Ketchums and David Bradleys.

The year 1857 is noteworthy for Greene’s written history. Daniel Bradley was an author of sorts—a diary keeper. His earliest existing diary is from that year, one in a series that continued into the Twentieth Century. I’ll save for a future article the story of the diaries’ departure from Greene and their miraculous rescue and return.

Male diarists of the 1800s kept track of the weather, farm events, expenses, and accounts payable and receivable. Daniel Bradley was no different. Yet he also recorded neighborhood happenings and his own comings and goings. Day by day he wrote about the present, never pondering the past or planning the future. He held his emotions in check; he wrote facts. With only one or two exceptions, he did not express his feelings.

For history lovers, a diary is a windfall. How thankful we are to peer into the past through the eyes of someone who lived it. Of course, we always wish for more detail. Sometimes alternate sources and speculation can fill in blanks.

Daniel Bradley’s 1857 diary reported farm activities such as picking stones, planting rye, and cutting hay; gathering apples, walnuts, chestnuts, and butternuts. He remarked that he found a sheep buried in snow six days. It was alive and rescued. He went to Smithville to be measured for a pair of fine boots. He purchased hilltop acreage behind his father’s farm and referred to it all his life as “Egypt.”

The diary mentions religious and social events—church attendance, a Grove Meeting at Long Pond, and Camp Meetings; debates, lyceums, and a lecture on Mormonism. Daniel sat with sick neighbors, watched with corpses, and recorded births, deaths, and marriages. He attended a lawsuit between neighbors English and Hagaman. On October 15 his entry reads, “All the citty banks broke,” his comment on the Panic of 1857. In November he voted and said the local election “went Democratic.” He bought a United States map for $7.00, probably a large canvas wall model.

In January of 1858 the schoolhouse burned. Within a week, the community outfitted the church as a schoolroom, and the children were back in class. Daniel drew up plans for the new school building. He recorded the genealogy of Tryphena Tarry, his mother’s mother, in his diary. Mr. Rockwell from Greene stayed on the farm for a week training horses and colts. There were barn raisings, apple bees, and quilting parties.

Genegantslet, sitting on the Catskill Turnpike, was not insular. French peddlers visited, a black preacher lectured at the church, and Daniel sold property to an English sailor. He attended the State Fair in Syracuse by train and sat through an equipment breakdown in Preble. And he began writing an occasional diary entry in what looked like a foreign language. That “foreign language” was actually a code, secret until solved a few years ago.

In the third diary, 1859, Daniel told of a trip to Greene on January 3. “Get cutter,” he wrote. A cutter is an open sleigh, usually pulled by one horse. In those days, families did not own every type of vehicle; it was common to rent a special conveyance when needed from a livery or a neighbor.

The following day, January 4, a Tuesday, he wrote his diary entry in secret code. Translated, it reads, “Start for Cincinnatus. Stop at Dierville.” (Dyerville was an early name for Willet’s four corners.)

Imagine Daniel Bradley driving a one horse open sleigh, wrapped in the family’s prized wolf robe, a heated soapstone warming his feet. The sleigh’s runners and the horse’s hooves are silent on the snow; the only sound is the jingling of sleigh bells warning other drivers of oncoming traffic.

Picture his route on the Genegantslet Road: north from his home, over the Bragg Pond (Echo Lake) outlet and on to Smithville Flats; past the stores and homes and Universalist Church and continuing along today’s Route 41 toward Willet. He pauses at a tollgate on the north side of Long Pond to pay the five-cent toll. At his Dyerville/Willet stop, he spends $1.50. Perhaps there are others in his cutter; did they warm themselves at an inn and purchase food and libation?

His narrative continues, still written in code. “Arive at Mr. O. Canniff’s. Eve(ning). Get married. Have an exelent time. Snows a little in the morn. Rather a fine day.”

So with no fanfare and no foretelling of his plans, Daniel Bradley and Miss Deborah Francis were joined in marriage in what we would consider a “destination wedding.” Why they traveled to Cincinnatus for the ceremony is a mystery. We do know that Obadiah Canniff was the bride’s uncle; his home still stands near the corner of Route 23 and Lower Cincinnatus Road.

The honeymooners spent the night at the Canniff home before returning to Greene, the bride’s younger sister and aunt and uncle riding along. Daniel returned the cutter to the livery two days later and paid $1.75 for the rental. He gave the minister $5.00 for his services, equivalent to a week’s pay for a mature, hard-working farmhand.

Even though married, Daniel and Deborah each went home to live with their parents. They did visit back and forth sometimes for a day or two. When spring came, Daniel built an addition to his parents’ home; the elder Bradleys moved into the new wing, and the newlyweds set up housekeeping in the main house.

After the couple married and the minister was paid, Daniel discontinued his secret code. Except for his first encoded entry, all the secret writings had been about his courtship of Deborah. Until she was Mrs. Bradley, her name did not appear in a diary except disguised as “Dtbsuyh.” Following the wedding, Daniel began writing her name as Deborah, and when their marriage matured, Mrs. B.

Now what do Jingle Bells and Genegantslet have in common? The One Horse Open Sleigh’s publication in 1857 coincides with the first existing Daniel Bradley diary. The song’s reissue two years later as Jingle Bells marks the wedding year of Daniel Bradley and Deborah Francis—1859. Daniel Bradley, in the cold of winter, jingled all the way in a one horse open sleigh from Genegantslet to Cincinnatus for his wedding.