[revwardoc]

Here's a F&I story that never made the history books:

Willimantic, CT, 1754

It was a very hot, dry summer with only a trace of rain. One night, the sound of marching feet was heard along with the murmuring of voice speaking in a foreign tongue. The people of Willimantic were sure it was either a raid by Indians or French troops, or both! The local militia armed themselves and went out to meet the foe, only it was so dark they could barely see a few feet in front of themselves. But the sounds grew louder as they approached the pond.

The militia commander called out a challenge but was only answered by the continued voices of the unseen enemy. He ordered his men to fire a volley into the night. And they did; and another; and another but still the sounds of marching feet and unintelligible voiced continued.

The men were ordered to save the women and children, and run for their lives. And so they did, taking up a defensive position on a hill overlooking the town, where the spent a sultry night waiting for death, or deliverance.

The next morning, the militia gathered their weapons, and courage, and again marched down to face the foe. The town was quiet with only a few dogs and livestock walking about. They returned to the pond and there they saw the bodies, bloated by death in the shimmering heat. But they weren't Indians or French; they were frogs!

It seems that the lack of water in the pond sent some primordial signal to the frogs who, as one body, left the muddy hole to find deeper water in the nearby river. The "sound of marching feet" was the hundreds of frogs hopping along the hard baked earth. The "voices" was nothing more than their croaking, which, I suppose to a frightened populace, sounded like some Indian language, or French.

Willimantic became the butt of many jokes after that but the people proved that they were willing to laugh at themselves. Today, the bridge spanning the Willimantic River is guarded by four huge frog sculptures.