Robert E. Lee’s son Rooney slated for execution

   Behind-the-ranks drama played out in mid-1863. Two Kentucky cavalrymen, William F. Corbin and Thomas J. McGraw, were caught in Kentucky recruiting for a new company. The district commander, Maj. Gen. Ambrose Burnside, quickly issued an order, stating that anyone caught recruiting “behind the lines” was to be treated as a spy and executed. Confederate officials in Richmond ordered the commander of Libby Prison to select two captured Federal officers to execute in retaliation. With word passing between the lines of the measure, Federal General in Chief Henry Hallack ordered two additional Confederate officers to be held, ready for execution, if the Confederates carried through with their plans. You can read more of this back story here and here.

   One of the Confederate officers selected for retaliatory measures was Robert E. Lee’s son, Rooney Lee. William Henry Fitzhugh Lee, called Rooney by his family, was born May 31, 1837, at Arlington, the third son of Robert and Mary Custis Lee. He attended Harvard University, but withdrew before graduating, being commissioned as a lieutenant in the 6^th United States Infantry in 1857. He served two years in Utah and California before resigning and farming at “White Hall,” on the Virginia Peninsula.[1]

   Rooney was commissioned a captain of cavalry in May 1861, rising to the rank of colonel, 9^th Virginia Cavalry, by April 1862. He was extremely active in many of Stuart’s escapades, from the ride around McClellan, the Seven Days, and at Turner’s Gap in the Maryland Campaign. Twice, Stuart recommended Lee for promotion to brigadier general, a promotion which finally came in November 1862. Lee commanded a brigade composed of the 2nd North Carolina Cavalry, 9^th, 10^th, 13^th, and 15^th Virginia Cavalry. Lee battled Stoneman during the Chancellorsville campaign. 

W.H.F. Lee

   While fighting on June 9, 1863, at Brandy Station, Rooney was wounded in the thigh. Robert E. Lee instructed that his son be taken to the Hill Mansion in Culpeper, when he visited him that evening. The next day, Rooney was taken to Hickory Hill, the home of his wife’s family, in Hanover County. Rob, Robert E. Lee’s youngest son, took Rooney to Hickory Hill, where they were joined by their mother and two sisters. Members of the 11^th Pennsylvavia Cavalry paid Hickory Hill a visit on June 26, capturing Rooney and incarcerating him at Fort Monroe the following day.[2]

   Rooney Lee’s arrival at Fort Monroe coincided with the debate regarding retaliation for the plight of the Kentucky Confederates. The names of two Federal captains imprisoned at Libby Prison were drawn on July 6, and word passed to Lt. Col. William H. Ludlow. Ludlow obviously informed his superior, for on July 12, he recommended that two Confederate officers who were prisoners of war be selected for retaliation if the two Federals were executed. On July 15, Henry Halleck ordered Ludlow to “immediately place General W.H.F. Lee and another officer selected by you not below the rank of captain, prisoner of war, in close confinement and under strong guard, and that you notify Mr. R. Ould…that if…Sawyer…and…Flinn… or any other officers or men in the service of the United States not guilty of crimes punishable with death by the laws of war, shall be executed by the enemy, the aforementioned prisoners will be hung in retaliation.”[3]

   Robert E. Lee learned about his son’s capture on July 7, while on the way back from the Gettysburg campaign.[4] Word of the holding of Rooney Lee and another officer spread via newspapers. “Prominent Rebel Officers Held as Hostages,” reported one Massachusetts paper. While the newspaper had the wrong Lee – it was G.W.C. Lee and not Fitz Hugh Lee, the paper reported that the officers “were removed from the McClellan hospital to Fortress Monroe, and placed in a casemate under guard, and notice sent to the rebel government that if they executed Capts. Sawyer and Flynn, whom they now have in close confinement and under sentence in Richmond, that Gen. Lee and Capt. Winder will be executed in retaliation.”[5]

   The Daily Richmond Whig reported that the execution of Lee and the other officer took place, then “the black flag will be immediately raised in every army, and the war will be horrible but short.”[6] Tensions remained high through August. Ludlow still believed that Sawyer and Flinn could be executed.[7]

  Of course Robert E. Lee and other members of his family, include Rooney’s wife Charlotte, were worried about the wounded officer. On August 2, 1863, Lee wrote Mary that he had heard that Rooney was up walking around on crutches. Charlotte was planning to try to visit Rooney at Fort Monroe, but Lee counseled against it. “The only way of accomplishing it is to get permission from Mr. Secretary Stanton in Washington through Mr. [Robert] Ould to take the flag of truce boat to Old Point. I do not think he would grant it in her case. It having been refused to others, which they would not feel as much objection in obliging, & I believe their permission is always coupled with the obligation to take the oath of allegiance to the U.S.”[8]

   Rooney’s confinement at Fort Monroe brought problems for the officers in charge. Local ladies weekly brought baskets of delicacies to Rooney.[9] Brig. Gen. S.D. Meredith complained in November 1863 that Rooney needed to be moved to some other “point where he will not be lionized as he is here. No prisoner of ours, whatever his rank, receives such treatment in Richmond.” It was recommended that Rooney be sent to Johnson’s Island, the same place where the two Kentucky officers were executed. The order for Rooney’s move to Johnson’s Island came on November 10. A day later, that order was changed and Rooney was sent to Fort Lafayette in New York Harbor.[10]

   Rooney’s wife, Charlotte Wickham, was never well, especially after Rooney was kidnapped by the Federals from her family’s home. Mary Chesnut, in her diary, recorded that Custis Lee, another of Robert E. Lee’s sons, even “offered himself to the Yankees in place of his brother, as he was a single man with no wife and children to be hurt by his imprisonment .   . . But the Yankees preferred Rooney.”[11] Charlotte died on December 26, 1863. Rooney was finally exchanged for Sawyer and paroled in March 1864. He rejoined the cavalry of the Army of Northern Virginia and was promoted to major general on April 23, 1864. When Wade Hampton, who replaced Stuart, transferred to South Carolina, Rooney commanded the Confederate cavalry south of the James River. Rooney Lee surrendered and was paroled at Appomattox.

   After the war, Rooney returned to farming, later serving as president of the Virginia Agricultural Society, then four years in the Virginia Senate, and several terms in the United States House of Representatives. He died in 1891. Jeffry Wert considered Rooney Lee “one of the finest generals in the cavalry corps of the Army of Northern Virgina.”[12]

 

 

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[1] Davis, ed., The Confederate General, 4:65.

[2] Knight, From Arlington to Appomattox, 281, 286.

[3] Official Records, Series II, 6:118.

[4] Knight, From Arlington to Appomattox, 296.

[5] The Standard-Times, July 18, 1863.

[6] Richmond Daily Whig, July 14, 1863.

[7] Official Records, Series II, 6:219.

[8] Dowdey and Manarin, Wartime Papers, 567.

[9] Pryor, Reading the Man, 367.

[10] Official Records, Series II, 6:484, 485, 495, 500.

[11] Woodward, ed., Mary Chesnut’s Civil War, 450.

[12] Davis, ed., The Confederate General, 4:67.

First Death Prize – Confederate retaliation for the deaths of Corbin and McGraw.

  

   In 1863, Federal general Ambrose Burnside authorized the execution of two Confederates captured in Kentucky. Burnside issued a general order after the capture of the pair, William F. Corbin and Thomas J. McGraw, members of the 4^th Kentucky Cavalry who were out recruiting. That order stated that anyone caught in Federal-occupied territory recruiting for the Confederacy “will be tried as spies or traitors, and if convicted will suffer death.” You can read more about that event here.

   Word reached Richmond in mid-May 1863 that Corbin and McGraw had been tried as spies, found guilty, and sentenced to be shot.[1] By June, newspapers in Richmond were reporting that the pair had been executed. A fellow member of the 4^th Kentucky Cavalry wondered that since the United States government claimed “as their boundary the whole of the Confederate States” how could anyone recruit for Confederate service “without subjecting himself to a like treatment in the event of his capture? It is to be inferred that the President sanctioned the act of Gen. Burnside, and that it is quite probable that other commanders will adopt a similar policy. . . If in the great struggle for independence our enemies force us, by such acts, to resort to their barbarous mode of warfare, they will be the responsible party. We must fight our enemies with their own weapons.”[2]

Libby Prison

   The public cried out for some type of reprisal. One Virginia newspaper editor believed that Capt. William P. Kendrick and Capt. Daniel E. Bonham, 3^rd Tennessee Cavalry (US) recently captured while recruiting in Tennessee, should meet the same fate as Corbin and McGraw.[3] Confederate officials were already moving in that direction. On May 22, Robert Ould, chief of the bureau of exchange, sent a letter to his Federal counterpart, Lt. Col. William H. Ludlow, that the Confederate government had selected two Federal prisoners of War to meet the same fate. Northern newspapers, Ould informed Ludlow, reported that five or six Confederate prisoners captured while recruiting had also been condemned to death. “In view of the awful vortex into which things are plunging I give you notice,” Ould wrote,” that in the event of the execution of these persons retaliation to an equal extent at least will be visited upon your own officers, and if that is found ineffectual the number will be increased. The Great Ruler of nations must judge who is responsible for the initiation of this chapter of horrors.”[4]

   On July 4, 1863, Brig. Gen. John H. Winder issued Special Order 160: Captain T. P. Turner, in charge of the Federal prison in Richmond, was to select two Federal officers by lot for execution.[5]

   There are conflicting reports as to how the two men were selected. A Richmond newspaper reported that the prisoners, all captains, were “formed in a hollow square around a table” were they were informed of Winder’s order; “A slip of paper, with the name of each man written on it and carefully folded up, was then deposited in a box on the table, and Captain Turner informed the men that they might select who they pleased to draw the names out—the first two names drawn to indicate the men to be shot.”[6] Many years after the war, a Federal prisoner recalled that on July 6, the imprisoned captains were taken to lower room and informed of the order that two captains were to be selected by lot and executed in retaliation for the execution of Corbin and McGraw. One of the officers present “suggested that a number of white and black beans should be placed in a hat, and that one of the Chaplain prisoners should hold the hat up in the air, and then the captains should step up and draw out a bean, and the first black bean drawn should be the ‘First Death Prize.’ The second black bean drawn should be the ‘Second Death Prize.’”[7]

   Regardless of the method, the names chosen were Capt. Henry W. Sawyer, 1^st New Jersey Cavalry, and Capt. John Flinn, 51^st Indiana Infantry. They were taken to Winder’s officer and permitted to write letters, then returned to Libby Prison where they were kept “in close confinement.”[8] The Official Records actually contain a letter written by Sawyer and Flinn, addressed to Winder, in which they complained that they were being executed for two men Burnside had executed. “Of these persons we know nothing, nor if the circumstances attending them,” the pair wrote. They were not connected to that part of the army, and believed that they should not be punished “for the alleged offenses of any other department of the army than which we served.” Instead, the two members of the Tennessee cavalry regiment should forfeit their lives, or some “other officers of like rank from Burnside’s department.”[9]

   The post-war article author wrote that the execution was to take place before noon the same day the names were drawn. The two “bade our companions farewell, and distributed a few trinkets we had on our persons, and then confided to our warmest friends a few messages for our families.” The guards appeared, and Sawyer and Flinn were escorted through the streets of Richmond in a cart being pulled by oxen. On the outskirts of the city, they met a Catholic priest, and Flinn complained that he was being executed without the “rites of clergy.” A reported friend of Jefferson Davis, the Priest rushed to Richmond to try and intervene. When the pair and their escort reached the tree, they stood in the cart while ropes were placed around their necks. The captain of the guard continued to wait, seemingly hoping for a message. The condemned sat down and then, as noon neared, stood again. As the “Confederate officer was raising his sword as a sign to the driver to move away… a cloud of dust was observed in the distance, and the Confederate officer hesitated for a few moments, when a horseman covered with dust, and his horse covered with foam, dashed up to the officer and handed him a dispatch. He opened it quickly and read, Captains Sawyer and Flinn are reprieved for ten days.”[10] Given that prison commander wrote Winder that the names were drawn on July 6 and Sawyer and Flinn addressed Winder by letter on July 11, the story related above seems unlikely.[11]

   Lieutenant Colonel Ludlow passed the news of the pending execution of Sawyer and Flinn up the chain of command on July 12, recommending that two Confederate officer prisoners of war be selected in retaliation.[12] Ould wrote Ludlow the following day, hoping to send “a communication more fully setting forth the views of the Confederate authorities in relation to the unjust and barbarous execution of Captains Corbin and McGaw.”[13] There was an enormous amount of correspondence flowing between Ould and Ludlow at this point in time, dealing with prisoner exchanges, including those captured earlier in 1862 and 1863, Vicksburg prisoners and Gettysburg prisoners. The Richmond Daily Whig reported in mid-July that Confederate Vice President Alexander Stephens was sent to Old Point to try and work out “the atrocities of the enemy… particularly in the case of Captains Corbin and McGraw.”[14] Lincoln was willing to travel to Fortress Monroe to meet with Stepens, but Lincoln’s cabinet refused and Stephens returned to Richmond.[15]

   The Lincoln administration turned up the heat on the matter. On July 15, General-in-Chief Henry Halleck ordered Ludlow to “immediately place General W.H.F. Lee and another officer selected by you not below the rank of captain, prisoner of war, in close confinement and under strong guard, and that you notify Mr. R. Ould…that if…Sawyer…and…Flinn… or any other officers or men in the service of the United States not guilty of crimes punishable with death by the laws of war, shall be executed by the enemy, the aforementioned prisoners will be hung in retaliation.” Ludlow did not need any further orders; if he heard of the execution of Sawyer and Flinn, he was to execute Lee and William S. Winder.[16] Lee was the son of Army of Northern Virginia commander Robert E. Lee; Winder was the son of John H. Winder. The threat of executing the two men quickly eased some of the tension. On February 25, 1864, Sawyer was exchanged for Lee, with the exchange of Flinn for Winder shortly thereafter.[17]

All of this begs the answer to the question of why Burnside was not held responsible for the deaths of Corbin and McGraw.

 

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[1] Richmond Dispatch, May 16, 1863.

[2] Richmond Enquirer, June 23, 1863.

[3] Richmond Dispatch, June 24, 1863.

[4] Official Records, Series II, 5:691.

[5] Official Records, Series II, 6:82.

[6] Richmond Dispatch, July 7, 1863.

[7] Stradling, “The Lottery of Death,” McClure’s Magazine, (November 1905), 95.

[8] Richmond Dispatch, July 7, 1863.

[9] Official Records, Series II, 6:107.

[10] Stradling, “The Lottery of Death,” McClure’s Magazine, (November 1905), 97.

[11] Official Records, Series II, 6:87, 107.

[12] Official Records, Series II, 6:108-9.

[13] Official Records, Series II, 6:114.

[14] Daily Richmond Whig, July 14, 1863.

[15] Schott, Alexander H. Stephens of Georgia, 379-80.

[16] Official Records, Series II, 6:118.

[17] Parker, Richmond’s Civil War Prisons, 83 n31.

The Execution of Confederate Spies at Johnson’s Island

 

   Spies are one of the more difficult subjects to research and write about. Several times over the years we have attempted to tell this story, whether it be Nettie Slater (read about here), Lottie and Ginnie Moon (here), or Rose Greenhow (here). At times, were spies really spies, or where they people who just got labeled as spies? Were William Corbin and Thomas Jefferson McGraw spies, or just at the wrong place and wrong time?

   William Francis Corbin was born near Carthage, Kentucky, Cambell County, in 1833. One of his neighbors, John C. DeMoss, chose to raise a company in Campbell County, and Corbin was elected first lieutenant. This was prior to the war. When the Federals invaded Kentucky, DeMoss, Corbin, and about twenty-five others returned their state arms, made their way through the lines, and, in September 1862, enlisted in Captain Thomas Moore’s Company, 4^th Kentucky Cavalry. Corbin returned to Campbell County in the winter months of 1863, working on raising his own company. He had with him Jefferson McGraw, who was also working on recruiting men in Campbell County. 

William F. Corbin (Findagrave)

   According to DeMoss, “the arrangement between Corbin and McGraw was, that they should meet at Daniel’s house on the night of the capture, and that Corbin and his recruits arrived on time. After waiting some little while for McGraw, and fearing that something had happened to him, he started his men on, in the direction of Paris, preferring to wait alone. Simultaneous with McGraw’s arrival, the [Federal] soldiers appeared, and surrounding the house, made the capture.” Found on Corbin were a commission from Brig. Gen. Humphrey Marshall, a blank book with forms and an oath to administer to new recruits. Corbin’s name appeared in the book as a “Recruiting Sergeant.” Corbin was armed with a Colt pistol and knife. Another member of the 118^th Ohio recalled Corbin burning some papers the following morning.[1]

   A Northern newspaper editor noted that “those captured near Morris’ Mills, are Wm. F. Corbin, T.J. McGraw and Samuel T. Reardon.”[2] Another newspaper noted that “Lieutenant Rickison, of the 118^th Ohio Regiment, with a squad of thirteen men, captured Jefferson McGraw and another man, in the neighborhood of Rouse’s Mill, on Wednesday evening [April 8, 1863]. These men were sent under guard to DeMossville.”[3] The newspapers imply that Corbin and McGraw were a part of “the notorious Capt. Jim Caldwell’s band.” Not long after Corbin and McGraw were captured, the 118^th Ohio ran into Caldwell and a chase began. In the vicinity of Germantown, Mason County, Caldwell was “surprised and completely routed… Caldwell escaped on a very fleet horse. Most of his men jumped from their horses and took to the woods… A carpet bag containing a large number of letters from the neighborhood of Demossville and Mullins’s Station, addressed to persons in the rebel army, was captured; also a pair of saddle-bags, containing a lot of cakes…horse shoe nails, yard, socks, undershirts, suspenders, &c.”[4]

   Corbin and McGraw were taken to Kemper Barracks, Cincinnati, Ohio, where they were imprisoned on April 18, 1863.[5]

   Following the loss at Fredericksburg, Maj. Gen.  Ambrose Burnside was assigned to be commander of the Department of Ohio. On April 13, 1863, Burnside issued General order No. 38. Stating that “all persons found within our lines who commit acts for the benefit of enemies of our country, will be tried as spies or traitors, and if convicted will suffer death.” This included people who were “Carriers of secret mails; Writers of letters sent by secret mails; Secret recruiting officers within our lines; Persons who have entered into an agreement to pass our lines for the purpose of joining the enemy.”[6]

   Corbin and McGraw were hauled before a military court martial in Cincinnati on April 22. Corbin was charged with recruiting within Union lines and carrying of the mail. Corbin pled “Not guilty.” McGraw was charged with recruiting within Union lines, to which he pled not guilty. Both men were found guilty of the charges against them and ordered “to be shot unto death, at such time and place as the Commanding General shall direct.” Corbin and McGraw were sent to Johnson’s Island, where, “subject to the approval of the President of the United States [Abraham Lincoln], to see that their sentences are duly executed at that post, between the hours of twelve o’clock noon and three o’clock P.M., Friday, May 15, 1863.”[7]

   There were attempts to intervene and stay the execution. Corbin’s sister Melissa went to Cincinnati, where she met with former mayor R.M. Bishop. Bishop confessed that he had already attempted to intervene, “so far without avail.” Together they went to see Nicholas Patterson, president of the local Union League. He promised to try and help. Melissa decided to appeal directly to Burnside. She was accompanied by Bishop and Patterson, and a local pastor, along with a petition addressed to Lincoln and signed by local Unionists.[8]

   According to one of the party, Burnside’s “only reply was that he had determined to make an example of these men and that the matter was out of his hands, and only the President had the power to give the relief asked for.” They asked if Burnside would forward the petition and request with his recommendation, but he would only forward the petition, and would give no recommendation. Melissa received letters of support from local Union men, and with an escort, made her way to Washington, D.C. Lincoln refused to meet with Melissa, and refused to read a letter she wrote to the President, commenting “that these men were bridge-burners and bad men and should be punished, and that he could not interfere with General Burnside’s order.” Melissa then returned to Cincinnati, relating her sad tale to Bishop, and the others, including General Burnside. John C. DeMoss, who knew the family and had accompanied Melissa to Cincinnati and Washington, D.C., received permission from Burnside to go to Johnson’s Island. DeMoss found Corbin and McGraw in “a common soldiers’ canvas tent; the furnishing consisted of straw and blankets for a bed, and camp stools to sit on. The men were chained to a ball which would weigh about twenty pounds, the chain being riveted around one ankle.” DeMoss explained to the pair about Melissa’s attempts with Burnside and Lincoln. Corbin and McGraw had won the admiration of the guards and prison officials.[9]

   The next morning, Corbin and McGraw were allowed to attend church, with Corbin speaking. DeMoss met with them in the afternoon, and they passed letters to him to deliver to those back at home. “Two hours after our interview,” DeMoss continued, the pair was marched out of their cell, “bearing their own ball and chains, each surrounded by a squad of twelve soldiers, to the shore of the island, where the waters of Sandusky Bay washed the green sward on the shore.” “The men were blindfolded, hands tied behind them, and seated on their coffins, facing the firing party standing twelve paces away… Standing about one hundred feet from them, I could distinctly hear the command, ‘one, two, three, fire!’ and the deed was done.” The execution took place May 15, 1863. “Afterward the bodies were properly cared for by the soldiers detailed for that purpose, placed in coffins, and forwarded by express, to their homes in Kentucky, the government furnishing transportation.”[10]

   Corbin was buried in his family cemetery in Carthage, Cambell County, Kentucky. McGraw was interred in the Flagg Springs Baptist Church Cemetery.

   How did Burnside get past ex post facto? Both the U. S. Constitution in 1788 (Article I, Sections 9 and 10) and the Supreme Court when it ruled in 1798 in Calder v. Bull prohibit passing a law after the fact that adds or increases penalties for acts people have already committed. Kentucky was not under martial law until July 1864. Since many in the North believed that Southern States could not leave the Union, how could Burnside get away with this?

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[1] DeMoss, A Short History of the Soldier-Life, Capture, and Death of William Francis Corbin, n.p.

[2] The Cincinnati Enquirer, April 15, 1863.

[3] Cincinnati Commercial, April 13, 1863.

[4] Weekly-Courier-Journal, April 21, 1863.

[5] Corbin, CMSR, NA

[6] DeMoss, A Short History of the Soldier-Life, Capture, and Death of William Francis Corbin, n.p.

[7] The Cincinnato Enquirer, April 30, 1863.

[8] DeMoss, A Short History of the Soldier-Life, Capture, and Death of William Francis Corbin, n.p.

[9] DeMoss, A Short History of the Soldier-Life, Capture, and Death of William Francis Corbin, n.p.

[10] DeMoss, A Short History of the Soldier-Life, Capture, and Death of William Francis Corbin, n.p.

Civil Defense and the Confederacy

   Mention Civil Defense (Cold War) or Civilian Defense (World War II), and we get pictures of Air Raid Wardens, the Aircraft Warning Service, blackouts, Victory Gardens, and scrap drives. The Office of Civilian Defense was established by Pres. Franklin D. Roosevelt on May 20, 1941, an effort to coordinate federal and state responses in regard to protecting civilians and mobilizing them for what became World War II. The program was terminated on June 4, 1945. In 1950, another movement began, this time labeled as Civil Defense, an attempt to try and prepare people in the advent of nuclear war. Many programs under Civilian Defense and Civil War defense were the same.

   Someone recently asked if there was a correlation between what the United States government was doing in the 1940s and 1960s and the Confederate government. Like most historical questions, the answer is no, and yes.

In the Hospital, 1861, by William L. Sheppard.

   Nationally, there was no one in charge of any type of program in the Southern Confederacy. (Really no program like this in the Northern states, either.) Civilian Defense during World War II was run by the governors in various states, who appointed county-level boards and committees. However, in most cases in the South, people in various communities set up what might be termed “civilian defense” on the local level. 

Ladies Aid Societies – at the outset of the war, various Ladies Aid Societies were set up to provide clothing and other necessities for soldiers. Just about every community had these organizations. The Greenville Ladies Association (South Carolina) held their first meeting on July 19, 1861.Their purpose was “to relieve the sick and wounded among soldiers, by forwarding to them linen, underclothing, cordials, bed ticks, socks, etc. Secondly, to make winter clothing for the volunteers of the Confederate Army.”[1] These aid societies were not just confined to large areas. Smaller counties likewise set up Aid Societies with the same goals. In the foothills of western North Carolina, the ladies of Caldwell County likewise formed an aid society in September 1861. They often collected necessities for the soldiers. This included normal things, like socks, shirts, drawers, coats, quilts and comforters, as well as the more unique, like three dozen candles, four bottles of lemon syrup, half a dozen cups and saucers, thirty copies of the New Testaments, and roots like slippery-elm, sage, pepper, mustard, flax-seed, hops, etc.[2] Women will continue to make and donate clothing throughout the war, but many of the uniforms were manufactured via contract or “piece” work. A depot would provide the materials, already cut out, and the ladies would take them home and sew them, returning the finished articles to the depot and being paid by the piece they completed. Sewing, especially during the Great Depression and in the days of the Works Progress Administration, often under the auspices of the Red Cross, was a major producer of locally made clothing and mattresses. Women mailed packages to their loved ones overseas, and took on jobs, making uniforms in factories.

War effort – during War World II, families were encouraged to save by-products from the kitchen, namely grease from cooking bacon, which could be used in manufacturing explosives (glycerin). The government went as far as to set up the American Fat Salvage Committee. During the 1860s, it was not so much bacon grease that was collected, but nitre for making gunpowder. The Nitre Bureau in Richmond ran an advertisement in a newspaper in 1864, asking the public for dead animals.[3] John Haralson famously posted in a newspaper in Selma in July 1863: “The ladies of Selma are respectfully requested to preserve the chamber lye collected about their premises for the purpose of making nitre. A barrel will be sent around daily to collect it."[4]

Hospitals were a kind of novelty at the start of the 1860s. They existed, but they were usually for the poor. Doctors usually made visits to patients in homes. With the excess of patients that the war produced, both those wounded and those who were sick with one of the many camp diseases, hospitals sprang up all over the place. Due to the number of soldiers passing through Charlotte in mid-1862 via the railroad, local ladies stepped up and established a hospital association. They acquired the wash house of the North Carolina Military Institute. The names of the ladies on duty were published in the local newspaper, while two other volunteers visited the homes of the Hospital Association volunteers to collect supplies – food and bandages – to staff the hospitals. The Confederate government later took charge of the hospital, but the ladies continued to volunteer. This was repeated across the South.[5] During World War I and World War II, the Red Cross employed “Grey Ladies,” volunteers who wrote letters, read, and provided other services to disabled soldiers. There were many medical volunteers in Civilian Defense during World War II, beyond the Red Cross, including doctors, nurses, and nurses aids.

Different Civilian Defense jobs,

Ambulance Drivers – along the same lines as those who ministered in hospitals were ambulance drivers. The Richmond Ambulance Corps was established in 1862. This group met the trains bearing wounded at the depot in Richmond, conveying them to various hospitals, and later the receiving hospital, for medical care.[6] During World War II, there were volunteer messengers recruited into Civilian Defense.

Scrap Drives – Outside of Rosie the Riveter, the most iconic image of the United States home front during World War II was of the scrap drives. School children and scout troops collected thousands of pounds of scrap in the way of old iron, tires, records, and paper to be turned into munitions for the war effort. Likewise, there were collections of scraps across the South during the war years. S.D. Rodifer advertised in February 1862 that he was paying the “highest price in Cash” for “Wrought Scrap,” brought to his shop in Selma, Alabama.[7] William L. Brown, in charge of the Confederate States Arsenal in Richmond, advertised in June 1863 that he was looking for “Scrap iron and Lead, Wrought iron and scrap lead.”[8]

Chaplains – one of the volunteer roles for Civilian Defense was that of chaplain, although the role is not clearly defined. During the 1860s, pastors of churches visited local hospitals, worked on collecting foodstuffs and clothing, forwarding the items to the front and at times taking the items to the front themselves. Several churches and denominations sent missionaries and colporteurs to the front with tracts and Bibles.

While not called Civilian Defense during the 1860s, the ideas were certainly woven into the fabric of Southern society.

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[1] C.M. Landrum, Minutes of the Proceedings of the Greenville Ladies’ Association in Aid to the Volunteers of the Confederate Army, 1861-1865, James W. Patton, ed., New York, 1937, 15.

[2] Semi-Weekly Standard, November 13, 1861.

[3] Richmond Dispatch, March 23, 1864.

[4] If you have an actual citation for this oft repeated quote, please drop me a line.

[5] Hardy, Civil War Charlotte, 34-35.

[6] Ash, Rebel Richmond, 14.

[7] The Daily Selma Reporter, February 10, 1862.

[8] Daily Richmond Whig, June 25, 1863.