| Brom Bones | |
|---|---|
 | |
|
Real Name |
Abraham Van Brunt |
|
First Appearance |
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow (1820) |
|
Original Publisher |
C. S. Van Winkle |
|
Created by |
Washington Irving |
Origin[]
'In 1790, Abraham "Brom Bones" Van Brunt lived in the countryside near the former Dutch settlement of Tarry Town, in a secluded glen known as Sleepy Hollow. He was rivals with the superstitious schoolmaster Ichabod Crane for the hand of Katrina Van Tassel, the daughter of a wealthy farmer. Unable to goad Ichabod into fighting for Katrina's hand, Brom instead wages a campaign of harassment against the schoolmaster, plaguing him with a series of pranks and practical jokes.
One autumn night, Ichabod is invited to attend a harvest party at the Van Tassel homestead. At the party, Brom tells the story of the Headless Horseman, the notorious ghost of a Hessian trooper decapitated by a cannonball during the Revolutionary War. The Horseman is supposedly buried in a churchyard in Sleepy Hollow and rises from his grave every night to search for his missing head, but is supernaturally barred from crossing a wooden bridge that spans a nearby stream.
Ichabod proposes to Katrina, but she rejects his advances. He leaves the party heartbroken and rides home on a borrowed plough horse named Gunpowder. He encounters a cloaked rider and believes it to be the Headless Horseman. Ichabod rides for his life, desperately goading Gunpowder down the Hollow. The Horseman rears his horse and hurls his severed head directly at Crane, knocking him off his horse.
The next morning, Gunpowder is found eating the grass at his master's gate, but Ichabod has mysteriously disappeared from the area, leaving Katrina to marry Brom Bones.
Although the true nature of both the Headless Horseman and Ichabod's disappearance that night are left open to interpretation, the story implies that the Horseman was really Brom in disguise, using a Jack-o'-lantern as a false head, and suggests that Crane survived the fall from Gunpowder and immediately fled Sleepy Hollow in horror.
Public Domain Appearances[]
Public Domain Literary Appearances[]
- The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent.
Public Domain Film Appearances[]
- The Legend of Sleepy Hollow (1912)
- The Headless Horseman (1922)
- The Headless Horseman (1934)
Public Domain Comic Appearances[]
- Jumbo Comics #35: Time travelers Stuart Taylor, Laur, and Doctor Hayward travel back to 1790 in Sleepy Hollow where they encountered Ichabod Crane, Katrina Van Dam, and Brom Bones.