Chapter 17

AT MAJOR CARTERS--MY SWOLLEN LIMBS GIVE ME AN EXCUSE TO CUT OFF THE CONVERSATION--REV. MR. BURCH GIVES US A HEARTY WELCOME AND A GOOD BREAKFAST--PASSING A CONFEDERATE SOLDIER--RECAPTURED--ECCENTRIC BUT LOYAL TOM HUBBARD--TAKEN BACK TO FORT EMORY.

Having partaken of a good hearty supper, we were given a room, and, for the first time in many months, I enjoyed the luxury of a good feather bed. Oh, how gratefully my poor tired limbs revelled in its downy recesses. It seemed almost too bad, to soil those snowy sheets with our dusty and travel stained clothing. Weary and tired as we were however, we soon forgot all our troubles, and were revelling in sweet dreams of home and loved ones.

We were awake bright and early next morning, and hastily dressing, we quietly left the house before any of the other inmates were awake.

This was Monday, the eighteenth day of our tramp, and we had passed through South Carolina and Georgia, and were near the extreme north-west corner of North Carolina.

We walked about two miles, when we came to the house of the Rev. Mr. Burch. He had been milking and was just going to the house with a pail of milk when we came up and asked if we could get some breakfast there. He gave us a hearty welcome to such fare as they could give us, and invited us into the house. We soon discovered that he was a strong Union man, and, although we did not reveal ourselves to him as Yankees, I believe he at least mistrusted we were. We learned from him that the Union forces had been at Murphy, and when we got across the river from there we would be in Tennessee, where we would be safe, as our forces held the ground there. We had told him that we did not intend to go back into the army, but intended to get inside the Union lines and stay there.

I being a member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, gave him some signs of that order, which he thought was a clumsily given Masonic sign, and, as he belonged to that fraternity, he tried to test me in the signs of that society. I told him I was not a Mason, but was an Odd Fellow, and he could trust me just as freely as though we both belonged to the same order. He said: "I do trust you, and believe you are all right, but when we express Union sentiments in this section of the country, you know, we do so with a halter around our necks. I have already said and done enough to hang me if it were known to the rebel authorities, and I know they would resort to any trick to trap me into saying or doing something that would convict me of treason to the Confederacy. But I will trust you, though I place my life in your hands by so doing, for God and my own conscience tell me that I am doing right."

He then gave us explicit directions about getting across the river, near Murphy, which was about twenty miles further. He said it would not do to cross the bridge at that place, as it was guarded night and day; but we could probably find boats above there that we could use in crossing. After breakfast he walked with us a short distance, and bidding us an affectionate good-bye and God speed, he turned back and we pursued our way.

About three miles further on we passed the little hamlet of Fort Emory, where I noticed a Confederate officer sitting on the stoop of the only store in the village. Passing by with a nod and a good morning, we were soon out of sight, and as we felt a little uneasy after this, we walked as rapidly as it was possible in my enfeebled condition.

The country through which we were passing now was mostly woods and sparsely settled. In fact, I think we did not pass but two or three houses in the next ten miles. At that distance from Fort Emory we came to a large house that looked as though it belonged to a well-to-do planter, and seeing the owner out near the road we stopped and asked if we could get some supper. We had as yet said nothing about paying, and he put on a long face when he told us that he had nothing cooked in the house. He was a miserly looking old seed, and thinking a little money might tempt him, I said that we were not particular what it was, but would pay him for any kind of a "snack," if he could manage to give us something that would stay our stomachs until we got to Murphy.

Mr. Harshaw--for that was his name--thought he might find something if we would wait awhile, till he could go into the house. While we were yet talking two mounted, armed men, came suddenly around a bend in the road, and galloped down to where we were standing, each with a drawn pistol, and a carbine slung over his shoulder. Dick Hancock the Sergeant, asked, to what command do you belong? 32d Georgia I answered. Where are you going? To Murphy to see my sister; giving him a ficticious name. Let me see your pass said he. I felt in my pocket and said, by golly Alban I left those passes in my haversack at Maj. Carters; and then turning to the Sergeant, I explained that we staid at the Major's last night, and as we intended to go back to-morrow or the next day, we thought we would leave the haversack which was pretty heavy, and our passes were in the haversack.

You can consider yourselves under arrest, said the Sergeant; and told his companion, Tom Hubbard, to dismount and search us. Tom was a very excitable person, and had a habit of spitting about sixty times a minute. He first took a large Morocco pocketbook that I carried in the breast pocket of my coat, and looking over the papers, came across my recruiting authorization paper, which I had received from the Governor, authorizing me to recruit volunteers, for the service of the United States. Tom read this aloud, spitting between each sentence. He read along until he came to the clause above spoken of, when he stopped suddenly and said: "You are a Yankee officer, by thunder!" I laughed and said: "Well, a Yankee could not guess better than that."

"Well, you are, by jingo."

"Well, who said I wasn't?"

Tom got terribly excited, and spit faster than ever, as he said: "Well, by thunder, you are a Yankee."

I should have laughed if he had been going to shoot me, and I did laugh heartily at his excitement. This made him more excited still, and by the time he had finished reading the paper, he was so excited that I could easily have disarmed him, but the Sergeant sat there, with his pistol ready to shoot if we made any attempt to get away.

I then told them that we were Yankee officers, and that we had for six months suffered the horrors of prison life, that we had escaped from Columbia, and had walked three hundred miles to gain our liberty, and pulling up my pants I showed them my legs, which were swollen to three times their natural size, and very much inflamed, and asked if, after having tramped so far with such a pair of legs, I was not entitled to my liberty. The tears started into Tom's eyes, his mouth twitched convulsively, he spit with fearful rapidity, and he finally said in a choking voice, "By thunder, I am sorry I ever saw you."

If I had my way I would let you go, but if we did old Harshaw, who is a bitter Confederate, would report us and we would be shot. And Tom meant what he said; for as will appear further on, he was a Union man at heart. But the Sergeant was unmoved by our distress, and was only too proud to think he had captured two Yankee officers, to contemplate letting us go; so he ordered us to walk between them back to Fort Emory, ten miles. No Sergeant, I said, I am your prisoner, only because my legs gave out; and I shall never walk back. If you want me to go back to Fort Emory, you will have to carry me, for if I could have walked you would not have seen me. He insisted that I start on, but I told him plainly that I would not walk a step, that I had just about as leave he would shoot me right there as to take me back into prison.

Tom finally said, Dick, you take him up behind you, and I will take this big fellow up behind me, and we will get along much faster. To this proposition the Sergeant consented, and we both mounted and started back. If I could have had a chance to have said a dozen words to Alban before starting, without their seeing us, we would not have gone far; but the Sergeant and I rode ahead, followed by Tom and Alban, and if I had made a move to disarm my man, Tom would have been just in a position to have helped him. I was on the alert, thinking that perhaps Alban would pinion Tom's arms from behind, and give me a signal to do the same for the Sergeant, which I could have easily done.

If I had only known what was going on behind me that night, this narrative would have a different termination. But I did not know Tom Hubbard then, nor did I know how strongly he was attached to the old flag. I learned all this afterwards, and learned to appreciate him, for a true-hearted, loyal man, whose fidelity could always be relied upon, and whose sympathetic nature was as tender as a woman's. The circumstances which surrounded him, compelled him to assume an allegiance to the Confederacy that his loyal soul revolted at. And there is no man North or South that I would give more to see to-day than this same eccentric TOM HUBBARD.