In the Border States
About In the Border States
A father in a border state leaves to join the Union army. Confederate foragers are shot at and scatter. One of them throws away his gun and meets the man's youngest daughter at a well. She lets him drink and hides him in the well when the pursuers come. Later the father is sent through the lines with a paper. He is wounded and makes it home. The older girl runs for help. He has the younger one bring a candle and burns the paper. The same Confederate breaks in, sees the child, covers the father with a quilt, and tells the others he is dead. She will not let him kiss her. They shake hands and salute. Union men arrive with a doctor.
Cast & crew
More about In the Border States
D. W. Griffith directed. Stanner E. V. Taylor wrote it. Billy Bitzer photographed it. Biograph released the one-reeler in 1910. A listing gives 17 minutes. Charles West, Charles Arling, and Owen Moore are billed, with Gladys Egan, Dell Henderson, and Mack Sennett.
Themes
Background
The short is set in a border state during the Civil War, with one family split between a Union enlistment and a Confederate forager.
Making
Griffith sets the rescue and the return in the same house, so the man the child hid is the one who later stands over her father.
Look
Billy Bitzer photographed the well, the house, and the pursuit.
Preservation
Prints are in the Museum of Modern Art and the Library of Congress.
Notes
- The girl stops a scream, then stands by the well while the Union men search.
- The father shoots a Confederate sentry to get through the lines.
- The Confederates follow a trail of blood to the house.
- The child's shot at the man in the bedroom misses.
Scenes
- The girl hides the soldier in the well.
- The father burns the dispatch.
- The Confederate tells his men the father is dead, then salutes the child.
Also available
- Internet Archive (10InTheBorderStates)
- Wikimedia Commons (In the Border States (1910).webm)
- Museum of Modern Art
- Library of Congress
