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large; some of them were James M. Duncan, John W. Douglass, David R. Bryan, Walter Magill and James Glass. While they were so engaged they observed William McLain (to them "Mose" McLain) and "Pade" Carns riding down the towpath as rapidly as their horses could go in company with four colored men, each on horseback. Mr. McLain was the director of the squad, and stopped to inquire the shortest way to Dick Bacon's cabin, a negro who lived on the mountain above where the Laurel run dam is now located. After being informed, Mose said there would likely be some one after them very soon, and wanted to gain time, and advised the boys to hold the "slave hunter" as long as possible, so he could get into the woods. In a few minutes thereafter the hunters appeared, also on horseback, and the crowd of boys began to stone them, when they turned and went back to Johnstown. The men living in the vicinity of Cambria Furnace were intensely against the fugitive slave law, and with the story told by Mr. McLain they got their guns and every weapon within their reach, and prepared to stop the slave hunters at their place. The latter did not return after the stoning, and Mose got his friends to Bacon's, where they were maintained for some time, and then sent on north.
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