Recollections of Thomas D. Duncan, a Confederate Soldier

In yielding to the request which has brought forth this effort, I shall not assume the rôle of the historian nor set myself up as a critic of any command or commander.

Amid the ever-growing dangers of that anxious year, our little command was ordered to Corinth, where the mobilization of the Western army had begun. To me this was a most welcom...

Our company left Corinth in September and went through North Alabama and Middle Tennessee, and I joined Forrest and arrived in the vicinity of Nashville in November. After scout...

With the fall of Donelson, the Confederate line was broken at the center; and Gen. Albert Sidney Johnston, then in command of all the Confederate forces of Tennessee and Kentuck...

After deserting the old warehouse as our picket post, we had to make some kind of “frame up” to report to our captain of the guard. It was about one mile to where the reserve wa...

There has been so much written about the battle of Shiloh that it is not in order for me to seek to contradict or confirm any of the various claims and theories. I shall adhere...

We made the first general survey, commencing at a point on the Memphis and Charleston (now the Southern) Railway about one mile and a half east of Corinth and running north and...

On May 31, 1862, in covering our retreat from Corinth, we came to a clash with the Union cavalry near Rienzi, Miss. We had advanced with a regiment to a position along a field b...

To meet emergencies at different points, this Grand Army of the Southwest was divided into a number of organizations. General Price, with one part, was sent west of the Mississi...

The command of General Forrest was not in the battle of Corinth, as it occurred while we were in Kentucky; but because of the sentiment that attaches to the place as my home I d...

After coming out of the campaign of Kentucky, the cavalry forces were employed to harass the enemy; and after the lapse of nearly sixty years, it is exhilarating to my imaginati...

After our return from this raid, we rejoined Bragg’s army near Murfreesboro, Tenn.; and Generals Wheeler and Forrest took all the cavalry and made a raid on Fort Donelson. Again...

On reaching Tuscumbia, Forrest sent out scouts in all directions to ascertain the purpose of the enemy. Upon the reports of these scouts, Forrest understood the general plan of...

Forrest’s cavalry virtually opened the battle of Chickamauga; and after the field seemed won by the Confederates, General Forrest climbed a tree and observed the confusion with...

After the battle of Chickamauga, Forrest, with 300 picked men, turned toward Mississippi to begin the recruiting for his third army. By December 1 we had quite an army of raw re...

After the return from our raid of 1864, our command was scattered from Okolona to West Point, Miss., for the purpose of recruiting and organizing for a greater campaign; but whi...

On March 1, 1864, we began another invasion of West Tennessee; but as the active troops in that section had been reduced to a few strong garrisons, we did not meet any serious o...

My brother, one year my junior, had just joined the command, when we went with a scouting party toward the railroad and met a small party of Union soldiers. It was the first tim...

In the beginning of the spring of 1864 it became very necessary that the granaries of South Mississippi and Alabama should be carefully guarded against a raid from the Union for...

The department commander at Memphis had collected another special army to overthrow Forrest and his troopers and to gain control of the only territory then entirely open to the...

Deeply disappointed over the many futile and disastrous attempts to vanquish Forrest and his troopers, the Union Army headquarters again, about the month of August, 1864, assemb...

In a short while after the Memphis raid our commander decided to go east and break the line that was furnishing Sherman’s supplies while on his advance into Georgia and the Caro...

The capture of the Union Army at Athens, Ala., was indeed the fulfillment of a great necessity with us. We took over a large supply of provisions and camp equipment, twenty carl...

Soon after the close of the Middle Tennessee raids we began our fourth invasion of West Tennessee, which section had already yielded to us so bountifully of the sinews of war in...

Returning from the Johnsonville raid, we met the army of General Hood. We were ordered to take the advance, and on November 19, 1864, our command was assembled at Florence, Ala....

January, 1865, found General Forrest bending every energy to the maintenance and recruiting of his force for whatever further defense might have to be made, and the Union comman...

Much has been said and written of that unhappy period immediately following the Civil War--unhappy for both the North and the South, because its memories delayed the reunion of...

That Americanism which to-day is a dominant world force is not alone of North or South or East or West. Out of the blended greatness of all the sections of the United States cam...