The Hunchback

This Beadle and Adams dime novel, "The Hunchback; or, The Cave Castle," by W. J. Hamilton (1868), is a romance set during the American Revolution in northwestern New York. The narrative opens at a lake where Chief Wando of the Oneidas meets Captain Samuel Stanton to warn of an impending British attack led by St. Leger and Brandt against Fort Schuyler. Their conversation is interrupted by Caspar Decker, a physically deformed recluse—a hunchbacked dwarf with "a huge, unsightly lump" despite possessing beautiful eyes and delicate hands and feet—who has lived in isolation for five years. Decker reveals he harbors hatred for Stanton's family and requests they meet elsewhere, prophesying bloodshed will soon stain the peaceful location. Wando departs by canoe after discussing the decimation of Native American nations through "fire-water and the sword." Stanton agrees to accompany Decker to his dwelling to hear his story. The fragment ends as they leave the shore.