AN OCCURRENCE AT OWL CREEK BRIDGE
by Ambrose Bierce
THE MILLENNIUM FULCRUM EDITION, 1988
A man stood upon a railroad bridge in northern Alabama,
looking down into the swift water twenty feet below. The
man's hands were behind his back, the wrists bound with a
cord. A rope closely encircled his neck. It was attached to
a stout cross-timber above his head and the slack feel to the
level of his knees. Some loose boards laid upon the ties
supporting the rails of the railway supplied a footing for
him and his executioners -- two private soldiers of the
Federal army, directed by a sergeant who in civil life may
have been a deputy sheriff. At a short remove upon the same
temporary platform was an officer in the uniform of his rank,
armed. He was a captain. A sentinel at each end of the
bridge stood with his rifle in the position known as
"support," that is to say, vertical in front of the left
shoulder, the hammer resting on the forearm thrown straight
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