Peter Teeple’s son Pellum tells an anecdote in The Aylmer Express article of December 7, 1933 about the Mabee and Teeple families (see Part 1). In 1825 he went with his father who had been asked to preside over a wedding – at a crossroads, at night. I’d heard the story before. My grandmother also talked about marriages at the crossroads. My cousin Lynda wrote about it in her story Mabee’s Corners.
He [Peter Teeple] left a very large library, and a complete register of the hundreds of civil marriages performed. An amusing incident was related by his youngest son, Pellum, in connection with one marriage ceremony he presided at about 1825.
The laws of customs of that place required that where no regular license had been procured, the ceremony might be carried out at some public crossroads at the house of midnight, the contracting parties appearing in night clothes, the justice and one or more others acting as witnesses. In company with his son, Pellum, the Squire repaired to the spot, a lonely crossroad, on a very dark night. Presently two groups approached from opposite directions, one with the bride, the other with the groom. Upon meeting, and the two principals clad in white robes, stepping forward, at the hour of twelve, they were duly married according to law. Pellum, then a young man of sixteen, said it made a lasting and weird impression on his memory.
Marrying at the Crossroads
Captain Peter Teeple, once living in Ontario, became a justice in 1800. Known as Squire Teeple, he presided over legal matters for many years. These matters included marriages, one of which was not soon forgotten. “Lasting and weird,” his son said of the memory of that midnight wedding.
Funny that one of the stories that my grandmother, Murel Mabee Anger, told about Mabee’s Corners was about people getting married at the crossroads. In her story, the couple were her several times great-grandparents. She says it happened at Mabee’s Corners, a three-way crossroad at the time. Pellum Teeple does not specify the place, but he was a kid and probably pretty overwhelmed by it all.
Grandma cut out and kept a newspaper article about it, likely this one. Are they talking about the same marriage? I can’t find anyone in her lineage for whom the dates match up, but she knew more about her family than I do. If it were a Mabee wedding, it would be a relative of the Teeples as well. Pellum, or the author, doesn’t say who it was. Odd though – two similar stories, same general area, in a time frame that fits. Makes you wonder. And sends a little chill up the spine. Because a crossroads at night kind of does that.
Spirits and the Blues
It’s not hard to believe that Robert Johnson played the blues the way he did because, as legend has it, the devil himself tuned Johnson’s guitar. At the crossroads. “And I went to the crossroad, mama, I looked East and West…” The legend ignores what’s more likely the direction he took: How do you get to Carnegie Hall? Practice, practice, practice. Learning from the devil at the crossroads makes a better story.
Lots of spooky stuff is associated with crossroads, especially at night. Gibbets for hangings were built at crossroads. Those who committed suicide or were executed were buried at crossroads. Those unhappy spirits would be stymied by the four possible paths to take, so would stay where they were. There’s also a more mundane reason. A roadway provides public land for those who could not be buried in consecrated ground. Also, with four roads, there’s easy access for those coming to watch a hanging. But the idea of spirits of lost souls hovering around, unsure of where to go, is more evocative.
“At a crossroads” is how we say we have to choose, make a decision. Once the choice is made, we move on one or another path. But there in the middle – the crossroads – is where no decision is yet made, all options are open.
Where the roads actually cross is neither one road nor the other, so the crossroads is often referred to as a ‘liminal’ place. Owen Davies defines liminality as “the state of being on the border or threshold of two defined states of existence” (2007: 45). These places are neither here nor there, and represent places where worlds touch.
– Icy Sedgwick, re. Owen Davies, The Haunted: A social history of ghosts.
The crossroads is where things that are out of the ordinary can exist and meet. Like the soul of a person whose cause of death precludes customary burial. Maybe too a marriage that needs to be rushed or is somehow iffy. And then, if you can leave the crossroads, everything will be ok.
Where to find more
For more on who and what might be at the crossroads, see Icy Sedgwick’s posts, “Crossroads Legends” and “Weird things you might find at an English crossroads”. David Cheal wrote a good article in 2022 about Robert Johnson and the many incarnations of his Cross Road Blues. The 1933 Aylmer Express article is reproduced on The Maybee Society “Notes” on Peter Teeple.
And, if you’re a Mabee, Secord or a Teeple, or just like going to Turkey Point, here’s an event for you later this month (from Grand River UELAC on Facebook):
