CHAPTER VI.

GENERAL WHEELER’S CAPTURE OF THE COMMANDS OF GENERALS MCCOOK AND STONEMAN.

On the 27th of July, 1864, General Hood ordered Wheeler’s cavalry to the rear of Atlanta with a view of beating off a Federal raid commanded by Generals McCook and Stoneman, having for its purpose the breaking up of Southern communications, releasing the large army of Federal prisoners at Andersonville, destroying manufactories, etc. Before leaving Atlanta General Wheeler divided his cavalry of about five thousand into two columns, Generals Dibrell and Iverson going to the left after General Stoneman, and assuming in person the command of the column to the right sent after General McCook. Wheeler came up with McCook at Jonesboro, thirty miles below Atlanta, where his troops were engaged in destroying the railroad tracks. The Confederates at once charged them. After a short but spirited fight, they drove them off with some loss in killed, wounded, and prisoners. McCook retreated toward Newnan, Ga. He was hotly pursued all night long. At a bridge, just at daylight, we came up with a large picket of the enemy. We at once charged them and drove them off. The entire command hastened over the bridge and in a little while came up with the enemy. A battle ensued in which there was a considerable loss on both sides.

After a little while the enemy resumed their retreat toward Newnan, hotly pursued by the Confederates. We here discovered that they had been looting and burning our wagon trains, which we had not seen since we left Dalton, and which had been sent south three months before. McCook, on approaching Newnan, had been fired upon by a militia command stationed at the depot, which caused him to turn to the left and take position in a hilly and wooded locality near the town, awaiting the coming of the Confederates. The Confederates arrived in a little while, though in a somewhat disordered and straggling way, after two days and a night of hard and strenuous riding and fighting. As they came up, without general orders they went into the battle where the fight was raging hottest. The battle, I suppose, lasted two hours. At one time the enemy captured the line of dismounted horses of the Fourth Tennessee Regiment, when the Regiment wheeled about and recaptured them, killing, wounding, and taking prisoners. The Regiment lost quite a number here. Among the killed was James Turner, orderly sergeant of Company A. J. A. Stewart lost his right arm. Both were good soldiers and most excellent gentlemen. Fighting took place in several places on the field. A white flag was displayed, and General McCook and about fifteen hundred of his men surrendered with a battery of artillery; also about three hundred of our soldiers who were with the train were recaptured, among them being a soldier wearing the military coat of Capt. W. W. Thompson (the only brother of my wife), of the Fourteenth Tennessee Infantry, who was killed at Chancellorsville, Va. I had it in a box in our wagons that had been destroyed by the enemy, and the soldier had put it on with a view of saving it for me, which I greatly appreciated, for I was anxious to return it to his father and mother. Besides the fifteen hundred taken as prisoners, some five hundred of General McCook’s men escaped during the parley. They were pursued to the river, which they crossed after abandoning most of their horses. Some of the men threw away their arms and accouterments to lighten their bodies, it was supposed, for swimming the river. As we passed through Newnan on our return to the Army of Tennessee, the hospital on the streets was crowded to overflowing with wounded soldiers.

Generals Dibrell and Iverson were equally as successful in their engagement with Stoneman near Milledgeville, Ga., capturing him and his entire command. McCook and Stoneman, when their commands joined, were to make a joint attack upon the prison at Andersonville.

After this Wheeler’s Corps was ordered to rendezvous at Covington, Ga., to the left of Atlanta. He had destroyed the entire cavalry force of Sherman. He remained at Covington some days recuperating and having horses shod, when he was ordered upon his second raid into Middle Tennessee. He moved to the rear of Sherman at Atlanta, and, going north along the railroad, destroyed miles of track, depots, and bridges, and capturing some small detachments, with but little resistance until he reached Dalton. Here the enemy had built a strong fortress well supplied with cannon, and had a considerable force to defend the place. A line of battle was formed as if we were going to charge, and by a feint its strength was developed. It was wisely concluded that the booty was not worth the cost of capture. However, we succeeded in destroying a large lot of provisions that had accumulated there and a large camp of wagons, tents, etc., located in the suburbs of the town, which were abandoned by the occupants, who, we supposed, had taken refuge in the fort. Some of these occupants must have been quartermasters, for an enterprising soldier picked up a tin box that contained several thousand dollars in greenbacks.

From here we moved to the right, and, entering East Tennessee, we crossed the railroad at Strawberry Plains, sixteen miles above Knoxville. Here a cavalry force coming up from Knoxville attacked our rear; but upon turning on them, they were put to flight and were pursued to the outskirts of the city, killing and wounding some, capturing prisoners and horses, with the loss of a few of our men in killed and wounded.

After this Wheeler moved over into Sequatchie Valley, where the Fourth Tennessee was detached and sent to Tracy City with a view of capturing a force that was said to be occupying an unfinished fort. Upon reaching the place, Lieut. Col. Paul Anderson made his disposition for capture by detailing Lieut. W. H. Phillips, of Company F, with ten men to charge down the road leading to the fort in order to attract their attention, when Colonel Anderson would come up from the rear, where the fort was said to be unfinished and open, and capture it. Before reaching his position, Colonel Anderson discovered that the opening had been closed and that there were as many of the enemy on the inside of the log structure as he had on the outside. He at once dispatched a message to Lieutenant Phillips countermanding the order; but before it was delivered Phillips, growing impatient, charged as directed. The courier reached there in time to see Phillips upon the ground in front of the fort shooting at the portholes, and saw him scramble to his feet and stagger across the road into the timber where his comrades had sought protection. He had been terribly wounded in the breast and shoulder, showing evidence of paralysis from the wounds. A conveyance was impressed with a view of taking him and others who had been wounded with us; but after traveling a mile or two, Phillips was suffering so that he asked to be left at a house to die. His friends thought that he certainly could live but a little while. For six months after this he was reported in company reports as killed in action in Tennessee. To the surprise of every one, and just before the surrender, Phillips came marching into camp, very thin and feeble, but alive. He said that after he had been at the house a few days the Federals found him there; and when he was able to be moved, they carried him to the fort and had every attention paid to him, saying he was too brave a man to die from neglect. Phillips remained at the fort for some time. When he had convalesced sufficiently, a proposition was made to him that if he wanted to go home to his family he could do so if he would take the oath. This he declined to do, and asked to be sent north as a prisoner. He was sent to Johnson’s Island Prison. Being a very much disabled prisoner, he was sent on exchange to Richmond in March, 1865, reaching the camp of his regiment a few days before the battle of Bentonville. He died a few years ago a highly respected citizen, but never recovered from his severe wounds and suffered the remainder of his life.

The Fourth Tennessee Cavalry left Tracy City for Lebanon with a view of overtaking General Wheeler. A great many of our soldiers were permitted to go by their homes to remount themselves, pick up absentees, and obtain recruits if possible. I availed myself of this opportunity, thinking it was the last chance I would have to visit my family, residing in Gallatin, Tenn., whom I had not seen for nearly three years. An account of this individual raid I made upon Gallatin I here insert under the head

BEHIND THE LINES.

I tell this incident, not so much to interest the present generation, who have lived so close to it and have heard for themselves from the enactors in the War between the States many and probably more hazardous undertakings than here related, but that the future generation may know the state of affairs that existed in this country about the homes of those soldiers who were driven from them and sought to see their families again after a forced exile of years.

Soon after starting from Atlanta on General Wheeler’s second raid into Middle Tennessee, in 1864, I resolved to go into Gallatin, my home and native place, and see my family, from whom I had been absent for more than two years. I knew that Gallatin had been occupied by the Federal forces a long time, and that the commandants of the place, Payne and then Scarret, had been placed there for their well-known disposition to lord it over a helpless and noncombatant population. Many outrageous crimes had been committed by them, and scores of Confederate soldiers had been brutally murdered for no other reason than that they sought to see their dear ones again. The darkest chapter in our War between the States could be written under this head. I was fully posted then of the hazard of such an undertaking; but I wanted to see my wife and little boy (who was but a few weeks old when I left there), and I fully determined in my own mind to risk it, as I felt convinced that this would be the last opportunity.

When the command reached the Sequatchie Valley, General Wheeler sent the Regiment down to Tracy City to take an unfinished fort that was in course of erection and to be occupied by a garrison. Fearing that we would not return in time to make my anticipated trip home, I went to Lieut. Col. Anderson, my warm-hearted and true friend, and told him how disappointed I was, disclosing to him my well-digested plan to go into Gallatin at night, stay concealed in the house all day, and return the next night, making myself unknown to any I should meet along the way. I reminded him that it might be possible to obtain valuable information for the army. The Colonel did not think my plan feasible, remarking in his nasal way: “Guild, you are certain to be killed or captured.” I told him that I had resolved to make the attempt and believed I could successfully accomplish it. He finally concluded to let me go.

Capt. Marcellus Grissim, Knot Harris, Billy Bell, and Clay Smith, Colonel Smith’s colored servant, went with me. These men all lived on this side of the Cumberland River and some distance from Gallatin, and I was the only one intending to go that far. We at once set out for Crossville, on the mountain, and then to Cookeville. Soon after leaving the Regiment we found ourselves in the country infested with the bushwhacking band of Tinker Dave Beatty, the notorious Federal jayhawker, a terror to Southern sympathizers in that part of the State, whose whole object was to kill, not to capture. On several occasions as we passed along the citizens would tell us in terrified whispers that he and some of his band had but a moment before preceded us, and death was certain if we fell into his hands, as they took no prisoners. To avoid such results, we concluded to lay by in the daytime at some secluded place and travel at night. Some very amusing things occurred during our night riding. A good many Federal soldiers belonging to Colonel Stokes’s regiment were furloughed and at home. If we chanced to meet any of these upon the road, and we sometimes would as we passed houses, we told them we were Federal soldiers and had been sent to notify them to return at once to their post at Carthage, Tenn., as it was rumored that Wheeler was coming across the mountain.

These things delayed the little squad of ours in reaching their destination. Captain Grissim’s home was in Smith County, near Rome. Before reaching there I had promised him to stay all night to rest up before I started alone for Gallatin. When I stated that we had been delayed so that I was anxious to start at once in order to get back and meet the command as it passed Lebanon, he still insisted, but I declined. Leaving my horse and Clay, the servant, with him, I started on foot to Gallatin. It was then near sundown. My first object was to get a boatman to paddle me across the river. I found much difficulty in this. I had on all my army equipment--gray uniform, two army pistols around me, and haversack in which I carried all my papers as adjutant of the Regiment. But over these I had on a long linen duster, which somewhat concealed them from view. I had determined, if I was captured, to have no evidence upon me as a spy or to disguise the fact that I was a Confederate soldier, though the old duster would easily conceal me, and I posed as a Federal soldier when asking information. I had walked some distance down the road when I overtook a man driving an ox wagon going in the same direction. I asked him if he knew where I could get some one to put me across the river. He replied that he did not, and wanted to know who I was and where I was going. I told him that I was one of Colonel Stokes’s men and had been absent on furlough at my home in the mountains; and that, having heard that the rebels were marching that way, I was hurrying to get to my command across the river. I noticed him eying me closely, and after a few words more he said to me: “Come, get up on the tongue of the cart. I don’t believe you are telling the truth; I have seen you somewhere before. You are no Yankee, but a Confederate soldier. My name is Walton. Tell me what you are after.” He spoke so frankly that I concluded at once that he would do to confide in. I got on the cart, told him who I was, and that I wanted to go to Gallatin that night and return the next; that I had left my horse and servant with Captain Grissim, and when I returned we would go over and meet General Wheeler’s command as it passed Lebanon. He knew Captain Grissim, but said: “If you go to Gallatin, you will certainly be killed. The meanest kind of an officer is in command there, and he kills every Confederate soldier he captures. Besides, I learned that they are greatly stirred up, are impressing the citizens to work in strengthening the fort, and have drawn in their picket posts close up to the town.” This was a worse state of affairs than I had anticipated; still I replied that I would attempt it. At this he said: “If you will go, get up and ride; I live about one mile down the road. Go by the house and get your supper, and I will put you across the river.” It was dark when we reached the house, and his wife had prepared supper. After supper I started; and after getting across the river, he gave me directions how to reach the Gallatin and Hartsville Turnpike, about four miles distant.

Unfortunately, after reaching the Sumner County side I remembered the house of a man whom I knew well as a most enthusiastic Southern man and in full sympathy with the Confederate cause when I left there. So I went to see him. He did not seem to know me; and when I told him my name, he still seemed not to recognize me. It was too apparent that two years of Yankee rule had wrought a change, cooling his Southern ardor; and I left him, congratulating myself that I had not told him where I was going. I fully resolved that I would make no more experiments in this direction.

I was now pretty well posted, so I continued my course toward the pike. A short distance from the pike I passed the house of another citizen whom I knew well, Mr. Carey. He was standing at his front gate, and I easily recognized him in the starlight and the candle reflection from his house, which stood near by. I passed, not intending to stop with a “Howdy-do,” when he remarked: “You seem to be traveling at a late hour and all alone.” “Yes,” I replied. “I am anxious to get to my command at Gallatin.” He spoke up quickly, remarking: “If you had been here a few minutes ago, you would have met up with scouts that stopped here, fed their horses, and got something to eat.” I asked him what direction they went, and he replied: “To Gallatin from Carthage.” He then set out and without any questions from me told me the same condition of things that my friend Walton had told me, except that he added that all the roads out of Gallatin were being scouted, as they were anticipating an attack then from Wheeler. About this time he stopped and remarked: “Listen! I can hear the horses’ feet upon the pike traveling toward Gallatin.” This was a very probable occurrence; but I could not hear them, though I seized the opportunity to start in that direction, saying: “I can probably overtake a straggling cavalryman, and I will get to ride.” I congratulated myself again, but with more satisfaction for sharpness than I did in the former interview, and with the fuller determination that this would end my interviewing of citizens and would risk all on the information I had. I am satisfied, however, that if I had confided my case to Mr. Carey he would have assisted me to the utmost extent.

I then began my travel down the pike toward Gallatin, about fourteen miles distant, stopping to listen occasionally. At Bledsoe’s Creek, six miles from the town, I stopped on the hill near the toll-gate to listen, and thought I heard the sound of horses’ hoofs on the turnpike. After waiting awhile, I moved across the bridge and, to avoid meeting any one, got over the fence with a view of traveling parallel with the pike until I came to a lane that led from the pike to Cairo, my intention being when I struck the lane to travel along it back to the pike again. When I reached the lane, I sat on the fence, and to save me I could not remember which end to take. I remember to this day my sitting there and trying to reason it out. I do not think I was asleep; but I was so exhausted from six weeks’ riding day and night that I became bewildered and chose the wrong end of the lane. When consciousness returned, I found myself near Cairo, more than a mile off of my route. I immediately turned and retraced my steps to the turnpike. When I reached it, the same bewilderment again overtook me. I stood there for some time debating with myself the way to Gallatin, and at length set out again, supposing I was right until I found myself approaching the point at Bledsoe’s Bridge which I had left more than an hour before.

I knew every foot of ground in the neighborhood, and had traveled these roads hundreds of times. My grandfather Blackmore’s farm was contiguous to them, and the people in the neighborhood were friends whom I knew and had visited. I had gone at least four miles out of my way; and looking toward the east, I could discover evidences of day breaking. I knew it would be death to be caught in that vicinity in daylight, and, tired, worn-out, and footsore, I struck a trot toward Gallatin with all the vim and strength I could command, determined not again to leave the beaten track. At Mr. Barry’s I took the old Cairo Road to Gallatin. At the Chambers farm I left it and, passing Mr. Calgy’s place, passed on to my father’s farm and house, south of Gallatin, on the Lebanon road and about half a mile from the courthouse at Gallatin. The Hartsville Pike that I traveled down approached Gallatin from the east.

As I got into the field near the house day was evidently breaking in the east. I looked toward town and saw a camp fire on Fitzgerald’s Hill, which adjoins the corporation line, and saw soldiers standing around. I knew then that this was the picket base, and that the vidette stand would be near the front gate of the yard that stood upon the next eminence in the road from the picket. The house stood on the opposite side of the road from the direction I was approaching. Thus the whole situation was before me. Concluding that there might be a foot race before the fight was over, I thought that I had better lighten myself for such an event, should it occur. As I have said, I had been carrying two large army pistols in my belt, and they had become burdensome, rubbing the skin on my side and hips till it seemed as if they were pieces of raw beef. So I concluded to conceal one of them in the fence corner and get it when I returned. I did not intend to disarm myself, and I retained one army pistol and a smaller one that I had in my haversack, a Smith & Wesson. A difficulty was the last thing I could wish for, but I wanted to be prepared for any forced defense.

I then proceeded down the fence toward the house, expecting to pass through the hedge of burdock along the pike and on to the opposite side from the house, where I remembered there was an opening covered by rails. On reaching it, I looked up and down the pike and saw the pickets about one hundred yards off, standing at the upper gate of my father’s yard fence and looking south, with their backs toward me. All seemed right at the guard post; and then, lifting myself quietly over the rails, I slipped across the road to the garden fence between the guard and vidette stand and, climbing over, fell into the garden. Another lightning process suggested itself to me--to pull off the heavy cavalry boots that I had swapped for with one of General McCook’s cavalry soldiers at Newnan, Ga., a few weeks before. They had skinned my feet till I could hardly hobble along. So, going into the summer house, I sat down on a bench and shed them, and never saw them again. I proceeded to the yard and, going around the house, saw a light burning in my mother’s room and felt then (which was a fact) that she was up with an invalid sister. I pulled up the back steps to a gallery in the rear, and, going to my mother’s room and making a smothered knock at the door, heard some one say: “Who is that?” In a low tone of voice I whispered my name, when I heard my sister exclaim: “Lord, ma, it is Brother George!” The door was opened, and I quietly entered. I could not, if I wanted to, tell what happened then. It was a sudden and unanticipated apparition. Both my mother and sister looked dazed and could not believe for a moment what they saw. If I had fallen from the skies, they could not have been more surprised. After some explanations and conversation, I asked for my wife and baby, and was told that they were on a visit to Nashville. I shall not undertake to describe the deep disappointment that this news created. I remember to have exclaimed in tones of deep despair: “Is it possible, after all, that I will not be permitted to see them?” After a little while my mother said to me: “My son, do you know the risk you are running? The soldiers are at the gate, and every day they are through the yard, and they frequently come into the house. There is not a negro about the place who would not take pleasure in informing them that you are here. The soldiers in town are expecting an attack. They are strengthening the fort in anticipation of this, and are impressing everybody that comes about town to work on the fortifications. Besides, if they capture you, they will kill you and burn up the house.” I said: “Yes, I understand all this and know what risk I am running. But if you do as I suggest, I do not think any harm will come of it. I have come to stay but to-day, and will return to the army as soon as it is night again. Let me go upstairs to the room looking toward town. I am so tired that as soon as I strike the bed I will go to sleep, when you can lock the door; and if any of you want to see me, you can slip in during the day, and there is no reason that any one’s attention should be directed to the room if you are vigilant and discreet. Let no one know the fact that I am here but those of the immediate family, for I did not come for or expect to see any one else. As soon as it gets quiet after nightfall, I will come downstairs and, after telling you all good-by, will start back to the army.”

I had to pass a long and open porch before reaching this room. Daylight was then evident. Looking toward the front gate, the pickets were plainly to be seen, and to shelter myself from their view I got down on my hands and knees and crawled to the door of the room. Without divesting myself of clothing, I fell across the bed, and in a few minutes was fast asleep. If any one came into the room before twelve o’clock in the day, I did not know it. About this hour I heard some one in the room, and, looking up, I discovered that it was my wife. She had left Nashville the evening before, and had come in her buggy as far as Hendersonville, where she stayed all night with an acquaintance, and then went on to her father’s house in Gallatin. Her father, Dr. George Thompson, who had been out to see me, had told her that I was at my father’s, and without getting out of the buggy she had driven on out. She said, further, that she had heard in Nashville the morning before that Wheeler was on a raid into Middle Tennessee, and that she had started at once that she might be where I could communicate with her if possible. I then asked to see my little boy, when she answered, “No,” saying that my mother and herself had concluded that it might reveal the fact to others that I was in the house; that the child was a great pet with the soldiers that came around the house; and that he was constantly telling them that his father had a gun too, and a pistol and sword, and that he was coming home soon and would cut their heads off and shoot them too. I asked if she could not devise some way for me to see him, when she said that she would contrive to get him out on the porch under a side window of the room, which she did, and I had the pleasure in this way of seeing him. At night when I left he was asleep in his bed, and before leaving I gave the little fellow a hug and kissed him farewell.

During the day members of the family would slip in and see me for a few minutes, one at a time. I saw only five people to speak to during my day’s visit. My father was at Nashville practicing law. He had to do something to meet the necessities of a large and helpless family. The large farm was in ruins, the stock was all taken, and the servants had gone to the Yankees. My father had been arrested by Andrew Johnson, who was military Governor of Tennessee, as a civil prisoner and sent to Fort Mackinac, Mich. After an incarceration of nearly a year, he was exchanged for Judge Ritter, of Kentucky. Gen. John H. Morgan had arrested Ritter for the purpose of making the exchange.

About four o’clock in the evening I was dozing upon the bed when I heard loud talking. Glancing out of the window, I saw Federal soldiers running through the yard in every direction in an excited way. I at once concluded that they had been informed that I was in the house, and that they were making their arrangements to kill or capture me. I concluded at once to meet it as best I could. I hobbled to a chair and, placing it in the room opposite the door, drew my army pistol, clicked the cylinder around to see that all was right, and, holding it under my coat so that it could not be seen, I awaited the issue. I remained in this state of suspense ten or fifteen minutes, I suppose, when my wife tiptoed into the room to inform me that a citizen of Wilson County had come into Gallatin that day, that the guard was after him to put him to work on the fortifications, that he had evaded them and had run through the large yard full of shrubbery to make his escape, and that everything was now quiet. I do not know that I was ever more relieved by a piece of information.

The five individuals mentioned above continued to slip in and see me until I left. They were much distressed that I could not take clothing with me, which, of course, I sadly needed. However, they managed to get me a soft pair of shoes to take the place of the army boots that I had abandoned. I do not think I am exaggerating at all when I say that if a corps of army surgeons had made an examination of my person they would have unanimously reported that I would not be able to move in ten days. Between nine and ten o’clock, all being quiet, I got up and adjusted my clothing, haversack, and pistol, and, taking my shoes in my hand, quietly walked down to my mother’s room, where I was to meet them before leaving. I quietly unbolted the door and walked in. I shall never forget that scene. It remains in my memory yet as a “death watch.” All were weeping with smothered sobbing. There was no occasion to remain longer now, so I immediately commenced bidding them farewell. The last to meet me was my old mother, who as she arose from the old family rocker and threw her arms about my neck said in these never-to-be-forgotten words: “O, my son! Do you not think your little army is already crushed and overwhelmed? I sit here day after day thinking and praying for you all and listening to the running of train after train of soldiers from the North, and feel that you cannot withstand such numbers.” I replied: “It is a gloomy outlook, indeed; but my duty as I feel it is to return to my comrades, to share whatever fate may befall them.”

At that I stepped out into the dark and began my sad tramp again. Somehow I felt stronger and better in getting out in the open air once more. I concluded that I would go around the pickets this time on their front. I stopped at a convenient stump and put on my shoes for the first time. They were exactly what I needed; they were loose upon my feet and gave me no annoyance. After traveling around, I remembered my other pistol, and went toward the place I had hid it. Upon reaching there, I searched and searched, but could not find it. After passing through a cornfield and at a point where the lands of my father and Mrs. Calgy joined, I noticed the tall weeds growing in the corners of the fence. It was a first-rate hiding place, and was inviting to rest, which I so much needed. The place was about half a mile from my father’s house, where I concluded to avail myself of a night’s rest and a day also before proceeding. I argued, too, that if I should be captured out there, there would not be such dire results--in other words, they would not interfere with the family. So I crept into the high weeds, and in a few moments was fast asleep.

When I awoke it was late in the day--a calm, crisp September day in 1864. I could hear the Federal forage wagons lumbering along the pike, and the Federals actually came into the field, which was a very large one, and gathered corn. I quietly lay in the weeds and ate the lunch my folks had placed in my haversack, partaking pretty freely of a bottle of blackberry wine, and then smoked my pipe. I recollect while lying there to have heard the thunder of Wheeler’s guns away across the Cumberland. When night came on I went back and had no difficulty in finding my pistol. I felt much refreshed after my night and day’s rest, but was absolutely perishing with thirst for water. The bottle of wine had produced it, I suppose. I remembered a wet-weather branch on Mrs. Calgy’s farm about a mile distant, and I broke for it. It lay just along the way I was to travel. Upon reaching it, I found a pool of muddy water. Kneeling down, I filled my stomach with the vile stuff; but it did not slake my thirst a particle, and smelled and tasted of a hog wallow strong enough to kill one. I filled my empty wine bottle full, and hurried on to the old spring on the Chambers farm, where my father was reared and educated by his uncle, Colonel Conn, who lived another mile distant, but still along my course of travel. Occasionally I would take a sip from the bottle and wash out my mouth, which seemed to do some good; and when I reached the spring, I filled my stomach full of the sweet beverage, which at once did me great good. I had never before come so near perishing for water, and I know now what it means to thirst.

Upon reaching the Hartsville Pike, I determined not to leave it till I reached Anthony’s store, where I was to go on to the Cumberland River, determining that if I met Federal scouts I would conceal myself until the squad passed; and then if I chanced to meet a straggler I would unhorse him and, mounting his horse, go at breakneck speed till I reached the point on the river where my good friend Mr. Walton was to come for me at a given signal. Fortunately, I met no one and proceeded on foot till I reached the vicinity of the river a little after daylight.

I found some difficulty in locating the exact place. Looking about, I recognized the house of a lady and gentleman whom I knew well. Having reached the time and place when I could throw off my disguise, I went over to Mr. McMurtry’s house. He and his wife were glad to see me. They had a good breakfast prepared, which I partook of very liberally, telling Mr. McMurtry that Mr. Walton had promised to meet me at the river on giving the usual signal. McMurtry seemed to understand this “grapevine” way of doing, and went with me, giving the customary signal himself. A few minutes later Walton came over in his canoe. About the first words he spoke were to tell me that Captain Grissim had been killed by a scout of Federal soldiers from Carthage on the night I had promised to stay with him and rest before going to Gallatin, that Grissim and two young recruits who were to go to the army with him had all been killed in their mother’s yard and in her presence, and that if I had consented to stay that night I certainly would have been killed with them. He stated further that later in the day, and after the scouts had left the neighborhood, he had gone up there and was told where he could find my horse and the servant, who were hiding out; that he had brought them down and concealed them; that the country, he understood, was still full of scouting Federal soldiers; and that I must go up to his house and remain quietly till night, when he would go with me to get my horse. Passing over the river, I did as he suggested. At night I mounted my horse and proceeded toward Lebanon, where I expected to meet some of our command. Before leaving I thanked Mr. Walton for his great kindness; and having nothing to give, I reached in my haversack and, taking out the beautiful little Smith & Wesson pistol, I gave it to him to give to his wife with my thanks for her goodness and her ever-to-be-remembered kindness to a stranger under difficulties.

I expected to close the details of this lengthy incident here, though I do not know how I could have said less; but I feel that I should tell one more hazard I encountered before reaching a point of safety, and it is as follows:

More than a year ago an elderly lady came into my office and asked if I was Mr. Guild. I replied that I was. Then she said: “I am the woman you met when you called at my house, three miles from Lebanon, on the Big Spring Road, in the fall of 1864, to inquire if there were any Yankees at Lebanon. It has been more than forty-five years ago. I moved to Texas soon after the war, and this is my first visit to Tennessee since I left. I have heard from you occasionally since through Tennesseeans I chanced to meet from time to time, and I have frequently thought that if I ever returned to Tennessee I would look you up. You remember the circumstances, don’t you?” I replied that I could never forget them. She then proceeded to tell in her own way that she saw me down on the road that night, and that I was seeking information. Three Confederate soldiers of Colonel Starnes’s regiment were sitting in the hall with me at the time. They had been visiting their homes in the Rome neighborhood, and were there when Captain Grissim and his young brother and nephew were killed by Colonel Stokes’s soldiers from Carthage, and were in search of their regiment. The Federal scouts, whom they were dodging in trying to escape, were patrolling that section. “Yes,” I said, “I remember to have seen them when they ran through the hallway into the back yard.” “Yes,” she said, “when you dismounted and started up the walk to the house, they seized their guns to get ready to shoot you, when I jumped up and said: ‘Don’t shoot! It may be some acquaintance, and I will go down and meet him to find out his business.’ At that they rushed out of the house. When we met, you told me that your name was Guild, that you were a Confederate soldier, and had been to Gallatin for a few days to see your family, and that you were returning to the army again. You then asked what the condition of things was at Lebanon, and if there were Confederate or Federal soldiers about the place. You said that you had come in with Captain Grissim, and that upon returning to the neighborhood of Rome you learned of the killing and had yourself been looking out for Federal scouts. In reply to your question I said that I did not know, had not been there myself or seen any one who had for the last day or so, and that everybody was afraid to go.” Thanking her for the information, I returned to my horse and mounted, proceeding toward Lebanon. She remained at my office an hour, I suppose, in interesting conversation. She told me her name, but, I am sorry to say, it has escaped my memory. I saw her no more, and suppose that she returned to Texas after her visit.

On approaching Lebanon, a deathlike stillness prevailed. I could see neither individuals nor lights about the streets or houses. The numerous white houses glistened in the moonlight like a whitened cemetery. I remembered where Mrs. Dolly Anderson McGregor lived. She was the wife of Capt. Andrew McGregor and a sister of Lieutenant Colonel Anderson, of the Fourth Tennessee Cavalry. She readily informed me that a Georgia command of cavalry had passed down the street toward Nashville about sundown. I concluded that they would stop at the creek about a mile away to water or feed their horses or probably to camp for the night. I hurried in that direction to overtake them. As I approached Seawell Hill, near the residence of Judge Abe Caruthers (now deceased), I came upon a picket. I went forward and told them who I was, and found out that the Georgia battalion had gone into camp for the night. I told them I was so tired that I would lie down at the post and sleep till daylight, when I would go forward and meet the major of their battalion, whom I knew. I took advantage of the opportunity offered to review the very successful campaign I had just finished; and, to be brief, I wisely concluded that the army was the safest refuge in time of civil war, and that if the war were to last a thousand years I would not undertake a campaign “behind the lines” again. There were too many unanticipated difficulties and hairbreadth escapes along the way. The day that I spent at home was one of untold agonies to my family, such as is hardly possible for human nature to endure. I could not and would not impose it upon them again.