The Cabble Monument (Rhodenbank)

the Cabble Monument Rhodenbank [88,6] St Mark's Hospital a factory Gable Walk Fire Station Sealy Grove the Cabble Monument the Starr Building Craske Park Fitzgerald Lane the Spenser Museum Basic Info: A monument is a city block containing a statue or similar piece of public art, without a building in it. It is functionally equivalent to a street, except that players with the Tagging skill can gain 2 XP for writing graffiti on a monument. This is, game-play wise, an empty block, and cannot be barricaded. After the July 3, 2009 update, some monuments became tall and can be seen from a distance with binoculars

Description

Humans and zombies alike will see the following (permanent) description when standing in front of the monument:

"You are at the Cabble Monument, an abstract concrete sculpture at the top of a low flight of steps."

The Cabble Monument is a 14-foot tall green monument located in the suburb of Rhodenbank. The monument displays the head of Samuel Cabble, an African-American who served in the Massachusetts 55th Volunteer Infantry of the Union Army during the American Civil War. Local legend has it that Cabble promised his wife that he would not rest until slavery and greed, the "Twin Curses of this Land", had been crushed. During a battle with Confederate troops, outside the small town of Malton, Cabble and the rest of his squad managed to recover sacks brimming with Confederate gold coins, enough to make them all rich beyond their wildest dreams. The men decided not to report their ill-gotten gains to the rest of the army, with Cabble being the only one to disagree with their decision, but rather than risk being shot in the back he finally relented. The story goes that they hid the gold in the hills near the town alongside Rhodenbank Creek, but that barely a night had passed before greed spurred the men to turn against one another. In short order guns were fired and men died. In the end, as if by some ironic twist of fate, it was Cabble who was the only survivor.

Fearing that greed would consume anyone who came in contact with the gold he left it where it was hidden and returned to the Union Army. Unbeknownst to him though word of the stolen gold had already spread among the rest of the army and when Cabble arrived back in camp he was arrested and questioned by the army commander. Time and again Cabble refused to tell them where the gold was hidden fearing what it might do to them, until in a fit of rage, the commander beat Cabble to death. With his dying words Cabble is said to have uttered, "I curse you... you and anyone else whose greed blinds them. May you never lay a hand on the gold you so desire."

To this day no one has ever found the stolen Confederate gold that Cabble and the others had hidden, but later generations chose to honor his memory by marking a spot along where the Rhodenbank Creek once flowed, now in the suburb of Rhodenbank, with this very monument. There are those who say Cabble's curse still lingers and that late at night, under a full moon, a survivor passing by the monument might catch sight of glinting gold... golden teeth set in the monument's smiling mouth. But older residents caution against trying to take any of the golden teeth as the curse still punishes the greedy; at which point a storyteller might make their point in the strongest way possible, by showing the blood-stained stump of their missing hand.

Still this all begs the question, "Why build a monument to a man whose curse bites off the hands of the living?". Why indeed. While the entire notion itself transcends any sane line of thought a survivor has only to visit the other monuments located throughout the suburb to witness a general theme to them all... one of madness.

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