The south side of the shaft, facing the railroad, was inscribed as
follows:


Sacred To The Memory Of
WILLIAM MORGAN,
A NATIVE OF VIRGINIA,
A CAPT. IN THE WAR OF 1812,
A RESPECTABLE CITIZEN OF
BATAVIA, AND A MARTYR
TO THE FREEDOM OF WRITING,
PRINTING, AND SPEAKING THE
TRUTH. HE WAS ABDUCTED
FROM NEAR THIS SPOT IN THE
YEAR 1826 BY FREEMASONS,
AND MURDERED FOR REVEALING
THE SECRETS OF THE ORDER.

The disappearance of Morgan is still a mystery,--a myth to most
people nowadays; a very stirring reality in central and western
New York seventy-five years ago; even now in the localities
concerned the old embers of bitter feeling show signs of life if
fanned by so much as a breath.

Six miles beyond Batavia, on the road to Le Roy, is the little
village of Stafford; some twenty or thirty houses bordering the
highway; a church, a schoolhouse, the old stage tavern, and
several buildings that are to-day very much as they were nearly
one hundred years ago. This is the one place which remains very