Congratulations to the anonymous commenter who correctly identified the object and its location – a sculpture in front of Scituate Town Hall – and one of the several scenes depicted, Supreme Judicial Court Chief Justice William Cushing putting an end to legal slavery in Massachusetts in the year 1783.
This piece titled “The Heritage of Freedom by the Sea” was created in 1986 by Massachusetts sculptor Sonni Waldo and is in front of town hall. It has four faces which are covered with scenes from Scituate’s history. On this particular section, you can see Chief Justice Cushing’s landmark decision rendered. Also depicted are Rebecca and Abigail Bates, “The Army of Two” frightening away the British troops during the war of 1812.
There’s also an image of someone drinking from the Old Oaken Bucket made famous by Samuel Woodworth’s poem!
Each section of the sculpture is packed with images from the town’s history and is well worth a look the next time you happen to be in the area!
The Bates girls … so they are not in the fields, but one has a bucket and the other a flute … or a pea-gun … how did they frighten the troops away?
Rebecca and Abigail played a drum and fife and fooled the British into thinking there was an American army marching into Scituate – or so their story goes! Their story is detailed in the links I provided in the body of the post – fun reading. 🙂