CHAPTER VI.

ORGANIZATION OF “FORREST’S CAVALRY CORPS”--THE SOOY SMITH RAID--FORT PILLOW.

When the snow began to fly, Company E was comfortably quartered in the vacant storehouses at Coldwater, thirty-one miles from Memphis. The men provided themselves with heavier clothing, some articles of which were brought through the lines from home, while others were secured through blockade runners, as those citizens were called who carried cotton to Memphis and brought out supplies on a Federal permit. The service was light, with no picket duty, for the winter was so cold and the roads so bad that a Federal raid could hardly be expected. But the hours must be whiled away. So, when the boys were not rubbing up their arms and grooming their horses, they were cutting firewood, playing poker or dancing. The dancing was a feature. Boots were heavy, but the dancers were muscular and strong. They could thread the Virginia reel or tread through the mazes of a quartet, but the eight-couple cotillion, in which a greater number could participate, thus giving more spirit to the amusement, was the favorite. In this the most intricate figures were practiced to give zest to the performances. These included the “grand cutshort,” which, as I recall it, after nearly half a century, was a combination of “swing corners,” “ladies’ grand chain” and “set to your partner.” In the parlance of that day, it was “immense,” for I feel it in my old bones as I tell you about it. The said figure was learned from a blue-eyed fiddler of Company H of Weakley County, who, like many others, after a short experience in 1862, concluded he couldn’t kill them all anyhow, and would, therefore, engage in more peaceful pursuits beyond the range of the conscript officers. James H. Grove and I, both of whom knew how to draw the bow, furnished the music, and the boys declared, of course, that it was good. Grove was the father of E. W. Grove, the famous manufacturer of medicines of St. Louis, whose remedies are sold in every civilized country on the globe. The father and I were fellow private soldiers in the army. The son and I, for some time after the war, sustained the relation of teacher and pupil.

One day, while on a short scout to Hernando, I met a body of Federals, under a flag of truce, who were negotiating an exchange of prisoners, the details of which were soon arranged with a Confederate officer. Very soon the Yanks and Johnny Rebs were mingling as if they expected never to shoot at one another again. I had the unusual experience that day of dining with the Federal officers at the house of Judge Vance, a well-known citizen.

On the 4th of December, Company E, leaving all impediments in camp, made a demonstration along the Memphis & Charleston Railroad, between Rossville and Moscow. While tearing up some railroad track we heard the noise of battle at Moscow, where Stephen D. Lee, with Ross’ and McCulloch’s Brigades, met with a hot resistance and considerable loss, while trying to destroy the railroad bridge over Wolf river. It was understood at the time that these demonstrations were made mostly for the purpose of covering Forrest’s advance north. He crossed the railroad that day at Saulsbury, and, proceeding north, received a cordial welcome on the next day at Bolivar. It was known that he came across from Rome, Ga., to Okolona, Miss., with not more than three hundred men, including Morton’s Battery, around which small command as a nucleus he was to form Forrest’s Cavalry Corps. His resources consisted of Ross’, McCulloch’s and Richardson’s Brigades, all very much depleted, with a few petty commands scattered here and there over the country. The weather was so cold and the roads so bad that we thought Company E was safely immune from an attack on its camp at Coldwater, yet Forrest was making a raid within the enemy’s lines, where he was to stay twenty-one days, defeat superior forces in five considerable battles, and day and night display such energy and military genius as would keep him out of the hands of the enemy, who were moving from many directions to entrap him. He set about collecting the absentees and other recruits, many of whom were without arms and poorly mounted. He acted upon the principle that an unarmed man was better for the occasion than no man at all, for, if a recruit had nothing at hand but the “rebel yell,” he could at least help to intimidate an adversary.

Bad roads and swollen streams had no terrors for our General, who, at the critical moment, turned his face south with his command greatly augmented, and with a convoy of wagons laden with supplies, besides about two hundred beef cattle and three hundred hogs.

The Seventh Tennessee did not participate in this campaign, the history of which is only slightly sketched here in order to give a clear view of the military situation at the time Company E was ordered to rejoin the regiment at Como, Miss. Great attention was now given to organization and equipment. Very many of the recruits had to be armed, and even clothed, before they could become effective soldiers. The work had to be done with dispatch, as we were now having more sunshine, and the roads were drying up. The enemy might soon be on the move. Forrest, having been promoted to the rank of Major-General, assumed command of all the cavalry in North Mississippi and West Tennessee. Within a few days the organizations were perfected, the Seventh Tennessee being assigned to the Fourth Brigade, commanded by Colonel Jeffrey Forrest, the youngest of the Forrest brothers. The entire command was greatly elated by the success of the recent raid, the addition of so many new men, and the prospect of serving under a man who knew nothing but success.

Rumors came in thick and fast that the Federals were preparing to advance both from Memphis and Vicksburg. The Fourth Brigade dropped down to Grenada, in order to watch and frustrate any movement from the south. We had frequently camped at Grenada, and the scenes were familiar. As for myself, I had known the country and many of the people ten years before--yes, indeed, before old college days. We occupied the very ground whence we started on the Holly Springs raid, about one year before. Who could tell but that we should start on one just as remarkable from the same place?

Strong columns of Federals were reported moving from Memphis. From his headquarters at Oxford, the Confederate commander made such dispositions of his four brigades as would most likely defeat the plans of the enemy, so far as they were developed. During the first days of February, it was discovered that about seven thousand well-appointed cavalry were on the road to the rich prairie lands of East Mississippi. Gen. Sooy Smith, their commander, moved with so much dispatch that Forrest, though moving with celerity eastward, found it impossible to head him off till the Federal forces had reached West Point. It was the morning of the 20th of February, 1864. The Federals, going down through Pontotoc and Okolona, had marked their advance by burning houses, barns and fences, and plundering larders and hen roosts. Up to that date, nothing like this had been seen in our part of the country. Our soldiers were aroused by the reports brought in. Of course, there was a firm-set resolution not only to give the ruthless enemy blow for blow, but to avenge the wrongs done to old men, women and children. It looked as if a great battle was impending, and the Confederates were never more ready. We did not know it then, but Forrest was merely trying to hold the enemy in check until reinforcements, under Stephen D. Lee, could arrive from some point below. Jeffrey Forrest’s brigade had already come in contact with Smith’s cavalry between West Point and Aberdeen, and was being pressed back upon West Point. General Forrest, attacking the enemy with a small force on their extreme right wing, discovered, to his chagrin, that they were retreating. There was nothing to do but to press them with energy, so as to inflict as great a loss as possible upon them. Soon it was a lively chase, and the men of Company E were, for the first time, to see Forrest in battle. He was soon right up with the Seventh Regiment, as the men urged their horses through that black prairie mud. Four miles north of West Point the enemy made a stubborn resistance, in the edge of a small woods, but the pursuers, dismounting quickly, drove them away in confusion. Again it was a rattling pace through the mud till the enemy made another stand, five miles further on, where they sought to protect themselves at a rude bridge over a miry little creek, by tearing down fences and making barricades with the rails. Here the Confederates again pressed them in front and on the flanks till they gave way. This running fight, with intervals of resistance, was kept up till nightfall. It was an all-day fight, and we had many sad things to remember. Our dead and wounded were behind us, even if victory was in front of us. Weary and worn, our men and horses were given a few hours of rest. Fortunately, the men found plenty of subsistence and forage in the camp abandoned by the Federals, which helped wonderfully in the work to be done next day.

By 4 o’clock on the morning of the 22d of February, McCulloch’s and Jeffrey Forrest’s brigades, led by Forrest himself, were moving toward Okolona, and driving the enemy before them. The distance was fourteen miles, over a road almost impassable.

When the Confederates arrived at Okolona, they found a strong line of the enemy drawn up in such a position that they could have made a stubborn resistance, but Barteau, commanding Bell’s brigade, and McCulloch with his own, promptly drove them from the position and rushed them in some confusion along the road towards Pontotoc. The Federals adopted the tactics of the previous day by forming heavy lines in favorable positions and resisting stubbornly till attacked front and flank, in many instances with Forrest in the forefront, they were compelled to retreat. The last stand made was at Prairie Mound, seven miles from Okolona and some thirty miles from West Point, where the fighting began on the morning of the previous day. The Sooy Smith raid was at an end with heavy loss to the invaders and a proportionate loss to the victors, for during the two days Forrest fought the 7,000 well equipped cavalry with a force only about half as large and made up largely of raw recruits. In one of the last encounters Jeffrey Forrest was killed at the head of his brigade, and died in the arms of his famous brother. No more pathetic scene was ever witnessed on any battlefield.

To look upon the ghastly dead or to hear the groans of the wounded lessens the sweets of victory and emphasizes the horrors of war.

After so strenuous a campaign, both men and horses needed recuperation, and so the Seventh Tennessee went into camp in that bountiful section of country about Mayhew, west of Columbus. It was easy to see that the military situation, now at the opening of spring, was such that if the Federals did not come after Forrest, he would certainly go after them. Therefore, preparations for a campaign were active and men and horses were put in the best possible condition. On the 15th of March Forrest with only part of his command was moving north for the purpose of crossing the railroad at Corinth and marching into Tennessee. By the 23rd we had passed Trenton and were still moving north without any resistance. We were now satisfied that either Union City or Paducah was Forrest’s objective point.

On the morning of the 24th Colonel William L. Duckworth of the Seventh Tennessee, in command of a temporary brigade, consisting of his own regiment, McDonald’s battalion and Faulkner’s Kentucky regiment, was ordered to attack the Federal works at Union City, while Forrest with the main force was hastening towards Paducah. Duckworth with his 500 men completely invested the Federal fort at Union City in the early morning and after a brisk firing, participated in by both sides, under a flag of truce demanded a surrender of the place. Lieutenant Henry J. Livingston of Brownsville, with a detail of three or four men of which I happened to be one, had charge of the flag of truce. When the firing ceased we rode up close to the fort, where an officer met us. Livingston requested to communicate directly with Colonel Isaac R. Hawkins, the commander of the post. This was granted and a short parley ensued in which Livingston, acting under orders of his superior, demanded a surrender. Hawkins demurred and asked for an interview with Forrest. Colonel Duckworth, being now called in and acting with an adroitness and finesse that were altogether creditable, insisted that he was acting under the direct orders of Forrest, who was near at hand with his artillery (sic) and who was not in the habit of meeting officers of inferior rank to himself. That most gentlemanly Federal officer, Colonel Hawkins, who was now about to surrender to some part of Forrest’s cavalry for the second time, wishing to avoid the effusion of blood, which might be caused by Duckworth’s imaginary artillery, concluded to make an unconditional surrender. When the facts came out and there was slight jeering on the part of our men, these men of the Seventh Tennessee, Federal, bore up manfully and turned out to be jolly good fellows, molded much after the pattern of the men of our own Seventh Tennessee, Confederate. Talking with many of the officers and men I concluded that their chagrin would have been amusing, if it had not been pathetic. Four hundred and seventy-five prisoners with all their supplies and camp equipage and three hundred horses with accoutrements were surrendered. There was not at that time an effective Confederate cannon in West Tennessee, and Forrest was well on his way to Paducah.

When the Confederates reached the objective point led by Forrest in person, they took possession of the town, but met with a bloody resistance when they charged the fort in which the Federals had taken refuge. They drew off with large spoils of war, consisting of horses and equipments. The whole force now turned south, having accomplished the object of the expedition. Company E was ordered to Bolivar, where the men, subject to order, dispersed to their homes to enjoy a furlough. The good old town “put her best foot foremost” and gave us a quiet but hearty welcome. Some of the boys “shucked their army duds,” and appeared in other vestments as beaux, for there was a bevy of pretty girls in Bolivar. In the round of dances and other social gatherings, there was many a sweet word spoken upon which, it was hoped, something might be realized “after the ratification of a treaty of peace,” as the Confederate bills all said. Doubtless, some of my friends found, when peace did come to the land, that love, even the platonic kind, which is sporadic only, is somewhat like Mr. Finnegin’s train, which was “off agin, on agin, gone agin.” In other words, the grand passion does not always stick like Spalding’s Prepared Glue or Aunt Jemimy’s Plaster, which the more you try to take it off, the more it sticks the faster.

But there was a bugle call and all good things must end. The men came rushing in to report. In the little excitement incident to the occasion, Sol Phillips, while romping with some of his fellow soldiers, jumped into what he took to be a large box, which turned out to be an old well. Sol soon found bottom and set up a yell to which there was a quick response by his friends, who drew Sol up greatly frightened but only slightly bruised. He still makes his home in the hills of Hardeman.

At the end of about three weeks, or more precisely on the 2nd of May, 1864, there was hurrying and scurrying among the soldiers. Company E was present in force for duty and McDonald’s Battalion was on the ground under Major Crews. General Sturgis, with a large force of cavalry and artillery, was in such close proximity that he would reach Bolivar late in the day. Forrest had already been properly informed and had given orders for our little force to check the Federal advance in order that everything on wheels moving south might have a better chance to escape. When the Confederates had been properly placed behind the old Federal earthworks, west of the town and the battle had begun, General Forrest with his escort came unexpectedly upon the field at a gallop and took charge. Knowing that he was fighting at great odds, at an opportune moment he drew off, but not until several men and horses had been wounded. Here D. Hill and John McClammer, temporarily attached to Company E, were wounded so severely that they were left in the hands of the Federals. Major Strange of Forrest’s staff had his right arm broken, but rode off the field. The enemy numbering two thousand sustained a heavy loss, forty or fifty killed and wounded, as they fought at a disadvantage, the Confederates being fairly protected by the old works constructed by Grant two years before.

The Confederates necessarily retreated in some confusion, as the Federals making a flank movement had the advantage when our men started to leave their partial shelter. Bringing forward their artillery they threw several shots into the town. One struck the residence of Mrs. Brooks, another went through the roof of the stable on the Harkins place, and I saw one cut off the top of a cedar tree in front of the Dr. Peters place, now the residence of Dr. Hugh Tate. Just think of it. Here was Company E, being chased through its home town. It threw a damper over every tender sentiment and all thoughts of love vanished into thin air, for we were thanking our stars that we had escaped death at the hands of the Federals. Just as we were procuring forage at the Dave McKinney place south of Bolivar, I heard the report of the gun in the hands of Robert Galloway that killed Major Sol Street, a somewhat famous partisan fighter or guerrilla. On the 44th anniversary of this tragedy I met Mr. Galloway in Memphis. In reply to my request to give me a statement in regard to the killing of Street, he said, in substance, that he killed him because Street had killed his father for the purpose of robbery. That a younger brother of Galloway’s was with his father at the time of the murder, and was able to give full particulars. The boy remembered the exact dying words of his father. Street and his companions did not secure the elder Galloway’s money as something, unknown to the boy, caused them to hastily leave the locality. This was when Robert Galloway was about sixteen years old. When in about two years he had reached the military age, he joined the army and was in the fight at Bolivar where Street was pointed out to him by a friend. He shot Street before they had dismounted at the bivouac, and in the confusion made his escape, but was arrested by Lieutenant Statler of Company E. He offered Statler a thousand dollars to release him, but the offer was declined. Galloway and others state that General Forrest was in a towering rage when Galloway was brought before him, and said that a drum-head court-martial would sentence Galloway to be shot at sun up. He tells me that he knows just how it feels to be condemned to death, but was not present at the contemplated tragedy, as he made his escape at daylight, and within a few days was safe within the Federal lines at Memphis. Mr. Galloway resided in Illinois till after the surrender when he returned to Hardeman county. He has reared a large family and is an excellent citizen.

There was much talk when we got quietly settled in camp at Verona, Miss., about the capture of Fort Pillow, an affair in which the Seventh Tennessee, being on detached duty near Randolph, did not participate. Most of this was in regard to what seemed to be the senseless conduct of the garrison after they must have seen that the place was doomed. After the officer in command had refused to comply with the demand to surrender and the whole Confederate force moved on their works, the entire garrison, having left their flag flying, fell back to a safer place under the bank of the river. Much has since been said by Northern writers concerning what they term an unnecessary slaughter. It should be remembered that this same garrison of both whites and negroes had committed numerous outrages upon the people of the surrounding country. These things had come to the ears of the Confederates and many of the victims had petitioned Forrest to avenge their wrongs by breaking up what appeared to be a den of thieves and marauders. Howbeit, part of them were Tennesseeans. Add to all this, that the garrison had been lavishly stimulated with whisky, as was evident from the fact that a number of barrels of whisky and beer with tin dippers attached were found by the Confederates, and it is not hard to see why there was unnecessary slaughter. The incident could be dismissed by saying that those within the fort knew that they deserved condign punishment because of the outrages committed on innocent people, and being somewhat in a state of intoxication, were incited to resist to the last extremity, while the Confederates were incited to victory by every instinct that impels a manly soldier to resent an insult and to protect the innocent. If General Forrest had no other victory to his credit, his fame would be secure.

Belated soldiers coming down from Tennessee soon brought to us the information that Sturgis took possession of Bolivar as soon as we had retreated on the evening of the 2nd of May, and burned the courthouse, the Baptist church, one of the hotels and several other buildings. Bad news for Company E.