McClung’s Tennessee Battery

 Many times, people ask where I get ideas. And to be honest, many of my ideas are connected. That first book on the 37^th North Carolina led to my books on the battle of Hanover Court House, Watauga County and the Civil War, Charlotte and the Civil War, the book on the Branch-Lane brigade, Feeding the Army of Northern Virginia, and in an indirect way, my history of the 58^th North Carolina Troops.

 But at other times, I come across little tidbits that make me just wonder what people or regiments or events get left out of the historical narrative. A few days ago, I acquired the two-volume Broadfoot reprint of Lindsley’s Military Annals of Tennessee. These two volumes provide brief glimpses of Confederate regiments from Tennessee. When finally tracking down McClung’s Battery, listed as Company A, First Tennessee Light Artillery, we simply get that Company A was under Capt. H. L. W. McClung. (870) A few pages over is a list of officers (877). But unlike other infantry and cavalry regiments and artillery batteries, there is no history of McClung’s command.

Crute, in his Units of the Confederate States Army, goes into a little more detail. The battery was organized in the fall of 1861 in Knoxville, Tennessee. It was involved in the battles of Fishing Creek and Shiloh, and then in the summer of 1862, was stationed at Vicksburg, then Port Hudson, then East Tennessee. In April 1864, it was sent with no guns to Saltville, Virginia (I’m not sure why they didn’t have guns). In August 1864, it was re-armed, only to lose its guns at the battle of Morristown, Tennessee, on October 28, 1864. The seventeen men who were left were transferred to Captain Lynch’s Battery and disbanded in April 1865. (317)

McClung's Battery, Shiloh (NPS)

The rangers at Shiloh NMP wrote a facebook post about the battery, and on another site on Barr’s Battery, the editors wrote a piece on McClung’s Battery. This is the most extensive piece written so far, about four pages. The battery was known as the Caswell Artillery. In December 1861, they were reported to have two-six pounders and two 12-pounder cannons. They were not really involved in the battle of Mill Springs, Kentucky, in January 1862, but were forced to abandon their cannon on the retreat. By the time of the battle of Shiloh, they were re-armed, and two pieces were in action on April 7^th. In May, the battery was attached to Statham’s brigade, Breckinridge’s corps. The battery was soon in Vicksburg, and in August, was ordered to Port Hudson. By this time, they apparently had rifled cannons. A month later, the command was in Holly Springs, Mississippi. 

By December 1862, the battery was in East Tennessee – David’s brigade, Heth’s Division. For the rest of the war, they bounced around between various posts – Loudon, Carter’s Depot, Zollicoffer. They were engaged at the battle of Carter’s Depot in September 1863, where they lost the carriages to their guns. In November, they were reported as having no cannons. They were sent to Saltville, Virginia, shortly thereafter. It does not appear that they were re-armed until August 1864, when it was reported they had four pieces of artillery. In an engagement at Morristown, Tennessee, in October 1864, most of the battery was captured. The seventeen who escaped were assigned to Lynch’s Battery. The battery was disbanded in April 1865 at Christiansburg, Virginia.

Several months ago, I was exploring Captain Hugh McClung’s service record. He was court martialed in 1863. Many courts martial records were lost at the end of the war, but parts of McClung’s survive. There were six charges against him – violating the 14^th, 36^th, 39^th (twice), 45^th articles of war, and  “Conduct to the prejudice of good order and military discipline.” Many of these charges concerned falsifying muster rolls, “misapplying an artillery horse,” drunkenness while on duty, and permitting his men to break into a train car. McClung pled not guilty. The court found him not guilt on most of the charges, but he was guilty of trading artillery horses at Corinth in May 1862;  “Habitually failing to restrain his men from trespassing and depredating private property”; and, “Habitually drawing and appropriating to his own use, rations belonging to his men…” The court found him guilty. His punishment was to “forfeit all pay due him from the Confederate States, and that he be dismissed from the service.” However, when Major General Simon B. Buckner reviewed the case, he disagreed, finding that the charges were “utterly unfounded… the offences of the accused were rather those of omission than commission.” Buckner recommended mercy. The general added that during the attack on Knoxville, McClung, there under arrest, “offered to serve in any capacity.” Buckner believed that “Such conduct was worthy of a good soldier, and merits leniency.” Buckner remitted the findings of the court and ordered McClung to report to his battery. McClung would go on to be captured at the battle of Morristown and spent the rest of the war as a prisoner at Johnson’s Island.

Can I say that this will be my next regimental history? No, I can’t. But I find the story intriguing and the credible information in the greater realms of Confederate histography lacking. Now you know how projects come to me.

The Confederate She-Devil Diarists.

   William H. Seward, Lincoln’s Secretary of State, once said after visiting Winchester, Virginia, that “The men were all off in the Rebel army. The women were she-devils.”[1] Winchester has a pretty phenomenal war-time history, one that has been explored in several books and many articles over the years. The old town was settled in 1732 and was once home to George Washington. There were six battles fought nearby, and the town changed hands over seventy times during the 1860s.

   Seward visited the area in late March 1862, following the first battle of Winchester. Someone asked Seward about Unionist sentiment in the town, and Seward made his now-famous “she-devils” remark. The question is an interesting one. Many in the North believed that the South was largely Unionist, controlled by a few rabid-fire eaters that had pushed weak-minded politicians into secessionist and war. And there were Unionist pockets and people, even in Winchester. But in early 1862, the South was firmly behind the movement for a separate country.[2]

   What led Seward to proclaim the women in Winchester “she-devils”? Seward was in Winchester to personally thank Brig. Gen. James Shields for holding off Stonewall Jackson’s forces at Kernstown on March 23. Seward, with his son and daughter, and Mrs. Ellen Stanton (wife of Secretary of War Edwin Stanton), spent about a day in the town and on the battlefield. While his time there was short, Seward undoubtedly had time to talk to the generals in the area and to base his assumption on their observations.

   Later, Seward’s “she-devils” came to be known as the “devil diarists.” Who were these “she-devils”?

(wikipedia)

   Mary Greenhow Lee (1819-1907) is considered the most combative and notorious of Winchester Confederate women. Her dairy is considered “one of the most informative records of daily life in Civil War Virginia.”[3] Lee nursed Confederate wounded at the hospital on Cameron Street and later nursed Federal soldiers as well, often giving the wounded soup and bread from her own kitchen. She later ran out of firewood. Lee and other ladies were known to veil their faces with bonnets, and when veils were outlawed, to use their parasols to shield themselves from the obtrusive views of Federal soldiers. In February 1865, Union general Phil Sheridan banished Lee from Winchester. She would settle in Baltimore, Maryland, after the war, where she ran a boarding house.

   Emma Riely (1847-1942) was just fourteen when the war began. She left a memorable quotation – writing that “People used to have a basket to carry their money to market in but it bought so little they could carry their provisions home in their pocketbooks.” When forced to board Federal soldier officers in 1864, Riely slipped into their rooms while they were out and stole brandy, lemons, and sugar which were smuggled to Confederates in a local hospitals.[4]

   Kate Sperry (1843-1886) was eighteen when the war commenced. Her father was a Winchester merchant who joined the Confederate army. In her diary, she kept accounts of the work she did in local hospitals and of the depredations committed by Federal soldiers when they occupied the town. On March 17, 1862, she noted that the Federals “steal everything they lay their hands on…” and in April wrote “How I detest these dreadful invaders, they are without exception the meanest set of poor white trash I have ever beheld!” Kate eventually married a soldier, moved to Goldsboro in 1864, and then to Mississippi after the war.[5]

   Cornelia Peake McDonald (1822-1909) wrote the earliest published diary of the “Devil Diarists of Winchester” (1875), having a profound impact on Civil War histography. McDonald noted that Federal soldiers stole the meal she was fixing her children on Christmas Eve 1862, then in May 1862, took her fence and firewood. While she refused to take the oath that would allow her to purchase foodstuffs for her family from the Federals or sutlers, she did work out deals to trade flour for coffee, sugar, and bacon.  The McDonald family would flee Winchester in 1863, settling in Lexington. She eventually made her way to Louisville, Kentucky.[6]

   There were others – Laura Lee, Portia Baldwin Baker, Ann Cary Randolph Jones, Margaretta Miller, and Mary Tucker Magill. There are even two who supported the Union, Julia Chase and Harriet Hollingsworth Griffin, who wrote from Winchester during the war. While there are other dairies and reminiscences from other Southern cities written or concerning the war, the “she-devils” undoubtedly have contributed more per capita than any other group, making the war-time experience of Winchester unrivaled in the annals of Confederate history.  What began as a nasty misogynist slur is now a title for informal historians who left behind critical records for the future study of the civilian experience in our nation’s great struggle.

   If you were like to learn more about civilians in Winchester during the war, check out Laura Jane Ping’s 2007 master’s thesis, “Life in an Occupied City: Women in Winchester, Virginia during the Civil War,” here.

 

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[1] The Pittsburg Gazette, April 7, 1862.

 
[2] The New York Times, March 30, 1862.

[3] The Winchester Star, November 4, 2014.

[4] Riely, Reminiscences of the Civil War, 107.

[5] https://witnessinghistory.org/kate-sperry-wartime-reports-from-winchester-virginia/

[6] McDonald, A Woman’s Civil War.

The Missing Confederate Supreme Court

   “The judicial power of the Confederate States shall be vested in one Supreme Court, and in such inferior courts as the Congress may, from time to time, ordain and establish. The judges, both of the Supreme and inferior courts, shall hold their offices during good behavior, and shall, at stated times, receive for their services a compensation which shall not be diminished during their continuance in office.” (Article III, Section 1).

   The permanent Confederate constitution, like the United States Constitution, calls for the creation of a supreme court. The wording in the three sections dealing with the powers of the supreme court contains almost identical language. Yet the Confederacy never actually established a Supreme Court. The Provisional Confederate Congress passed a statute stating that the Supreme Court should temporarily consist of a quorum of all sitting Confederate district judges (Article III, section 1.) Yet on July 31, 1861, a law passed by the Provisional Confederate Congress stated the Supreme Court would not meet until properly organized. Writing in 1963, Charles R. Lee, Jr. noted that the reasoning behind this was due to the distance between the various districts.[1]

   When the first session of the regular Confederate Congress met in February 1862, President Davis submitted an address, in which he called “the attention of Congress to the duty of organizing a Supreme Court of the Confederate States, in accordance with the mandate of the Constitution.”[2] The Senate Judiciary Committee, led by Thomas J. Semmes, Louisiana, presented a bill to organize the Supreme Court on March 11. The court would consist of a chief justice and three associate justices.[3] On March 26, 1862, this one sentence appeared in the congressional record: “The bill to organize a Supreme Court was postponed indefinitely.”[4] (A bill to organize the Supreme Court in the Confederate House was not entered until April 10, 1862.)

   So what took place over those fifteen days that led to the indefinite postponement of the organization of the supreme court? That’s not really clear. Information on the Confederate Congress and Confederate Senators and Representatives is extremely poor. On September 26, 1862, Senator Benjamin Hill, Georgia, now chairman of the Judiciary Committee, introduced a bill to again organize a Supreme Court. Hill felt a Supreme Court was a necessity and alluded to a “Circuit Court Judge in Georgia [who] had decided against the constitutionality of the conscript law and was discharging conscripts.” Hill “feared that in the absence of the Supreme Court difficulties would arise for which there would be no remedy. The government, without this court was a lame and limping affair. The Supreme Court was as much demanded by the Constitution as the Congress or the President.” By a vote of 10 to 9, the Senate agreed to take up the vote.[5]   

   Again in January 1863, the discussion came up about the court. This time, the recorded debate adds to our knowledge of the thinking of the day. Semmes and Hill were in favor of the bill to establish the court. “We ought now to perfect the Government,” Semmes believed. Hill read from reports from the Attorney General and the Secretary of the Treasury “to show the urgent necessity of the organization of the court.” Senator Henry Burnett, Kentucky, was opposed, believing that the lack of a court had no negative impact on the population nor on foreign relations. Burnett was afraid that the establishment of a Supreme Court “would create sinecures for judges that he did not want.” Senator James Phelan, Mississippi, could see no need in the past two years, nor could he envision any cases within the next ten years, that would justify the need for a Supreme Court. For the next couple of days, the senators haggled over the number of justices, and salaries. Senator Louis Wigfall of Texas thought the bill unconstitutional, as it gave the Supreme Court power over the lower courts.[6]

   The debate lasted into February. Senator Robert W. Barnwell, South Carolina, was opposed to certain aspects of the bill. “It was because the old Supreme Court, no doubt conscientiously, construed the law so as to cover up all the legislation of the country that the people of the North, educated in the belief of the indissolubility of the Government and the supremacy of the Supreme Court, felt themselves authorized to do what they are now attempting… It was a monstrous doctrine that the Supreme Court could have appellate jurisdiction over the State courts.” Senator Clement Clay introduced an amendment to repeal the review provision of the bill, which was approved 16-6. The Confederate Senate then approved the bill to establish the court, 14-8.[7] The bill went to the Confederate House, where it never passed. Thus failed the best attempt to pass a bill to establish a Confederate Supreme Court.

   So what do scholars, the few who have addressed the issue, say in regards to the Confederate Supreme Court? Sidney Brummer argues that since the state courts tended to uphold most Confederate measures, there was not much of a need or pressure to create a Supreme Court.[8] William Robinson, Jr., tends to side with Brummer.[9] Charles E. George believes that had a Confederate Supreme Court been organized, the states would have ignored it, believing that the state supreme courts were indeed supreme.[10] However, David Currie contends that like the Federal government, the Confederate government needed a uniform interpretation of law. The Confederacy “similarly cried out for Supreme Court review of state court decisions respecting Confederate law.”[11] Wilfred Yearns believed that members of Congress were afraid of Jefferson Davis’s court picks. Alabama delegates were afraid the former US Associate Justice John A. Campbell would be appointed to the court. “enemies of the Davis administration feared that Davis would pack the Supreme Court with his ‘pets’ and particularly that Judah P. Benjamin would become Chief Justice,” Yearns wrote.[12]

   All sides in the debate are probably correct. The Conscription Act and the suspension of the writ of Habitus Corpus would be prime examples. That is fodder for another blog post…

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[1] Lee, The Confederate Constitutions, 109.

[2] The Messages and Papers of Jefferson Davis and the Confederacy, 1:192.

[3] Southern Historical Society Papers, [SHSP] 44:137-8

[4] SHSP, 45:6.

[5] SHSP, 46:245, 246.

[6] SHSP, 47:197-201, 206-211, 223-225.

[7] SHSP 48:39, 324.

[8] “The Judicial Interpretation of the Confederate Constitution,” 133.

[9] Justice in Grey, 436.

[10] “The Supreme Court of the Confederate States of America,” 599.

[11] “Through the Looking-Glass: The Confederate Constitution in Congress, 1861-1865,” 1376.

[12] The Confederate Congress, 249, n.68, 69.

The four battles of Carter’s Depot

   Not long ago, I acquired a little book by Lawrence M. Jarratt entitled A Complete County by County Guide to Civil War Battles, Actions, Engagements, Skirmishes, Affairs, Reconnaissances, Expeditions, Scouts and Camps in Tennessee (1986). For Carter County, Tennessee, there are four skirmishes noted, all centering around a spot then known as Carter’s Depot or Carter’s Station, now known as the town of Watauga, Tennessee. Since Carter County’s war-time history is a big gap, this post, hopefully with several others I have written in the past couple of years, will fill in a few holes. (The town of Watauga is on the Carter-Washington County border.)

   At the time of the war, Carter’s depot was a simple stop on the East Tennessee and Virginia Railroad. The line, constructed in the 1850s, was the most direct route between the lower and upper South, and it was vitally important until it was lost to the Federals in September 1863. The site had a depot, water tank, and possibly a telegraph office, with the wooden trestle sixty feet high and four hundred feet long bridging the Watauga River.[1]

   It was in November 1861 that the bridge first came under attack… almost. A group of Unionists planned to burn several bridges in east Tennessee, and while the Confederates in the area were immobilized, Federal forces would sweep in from Kentucky and capture the area. The bridge over the Watauga River at Carter’s Depot was one of the bridges targeted. However, the saboteurs found this bridge heavily guarded, and they abandoned this target to concentrate their efforts on another bridge.   Several of the bridges were burned, but the Federal forces failed to materialize and several of the bridge burners were caught and either hanged or imprisoned.[2]

   It would be a year before any serious action transpired at Carter’s Depot. In December 1862, Brig. Gen. Samuel P. Carter (US) led a cavalry raid out of east Kentucky and into east Tennessee. His goal was to break up the East Tennessee and Virginia Railroad. Upon leaving Blountville, Carter sent Col. Charles J. Walker, with six companies, to capture the depot. Before arriving at the depot, Walker captured a train with several Confederates onboard, including Colonel Love. On arriving at Carter’s Depot, Walker attacked. “The enemy made a spirited resistance for a few minutes and then fled to the brush,” Walker wrote. Federal losses were 1 killed, 4 wounded. Confederates lost 12 killed, 15 or 20 wounded, and 138 captured. Walker then proceeded to burn the bridge and camp, before departing. The captured Confederate officer was Col. Robert G.A. Love, 62^nd North Carolina Troops. Confederate losses were reported as somewhere around 7 wounded, one mortally, and 114 captured, all members of the 62^nd North Carolina Troops.[3]  

   The bridge was rebuilt, and earthworks were added to protect defenders. The next series of skirmishes came in September 1863. When Confederate forces stripped defenders from east Tennessee to support Braxton Bragg and the Army of Tennessee during the Chickamauga campaign, there was a void left in the area, a void quickly filled by Federal troops from Kentucky. Federal soldiers drove east, trying to secure as much territory as possible. Federal artillery bombarded Confederate defenders at Carter’s Depot on September 21 and 22. Flanked out of their entrenchments, the Confederates retreated to Zollicoffer, burning the bridge over the Watauga River at Carter’s Depot as they left.  [4]

   Much of East Tennessee, from Carter’ Depot to Knoxville, became a no-man’s land for the rest of the war. There were times when  the Federals were in possession of Greeneville, and Longstreet’s divisions wintered near Rogersville in early 1864, but the area was susceptible to frequent raids by Union troops, Confederate troops, and bands of dissidents.

   Once the Federals returned west toward Knoxville, Confederate forces again occupied the defenses around Carter’s Depot. In April 1864, Federal commander Maj. Gen. John M. Schofield was ordered to destroy the bridges about Bull’s Gap. While Carter’s Depot was not specifically mentioned in Federal orders, the bridges over the Watauga were. A combined cavalry and infantry force set out from Bull’s Gap on April 24. On April 27, Schofield reported that “the rebels destroyed the bridge [Watauga] after being driven across it by our cavalry.” The event was obviously, for a short time, a pretty hot skirmish, as Federal losses were reported as three killed and eighteen wounded. However, the bridge was too high to be forded. Confederate General Simon Buckner reported to Richmond on April 26 that skirmishing had started the day before at Carter’s Depot. Buckner, however, felt that if the Federal attack was too large, the Confederate defenders at Carter’s Depot should fall back to Zollicoffer. However, Buckner ordered the area commander to hold Carter’s Depot if possible.[5]

Brig. Gen. John C. Vaughn

   In September 1864 came Maj. Gen. Stephen G. Burbridge’s (US) raid into the area. On September 30, Brig. Gen. Jacob Ammem (US) led a force from Jonesborough toward Carter’s Depot. The Federals attacked, driving many of the Confederate defenders from their entrenchments and back across the river. The next morning, with artillery posted “advantageously,” the Federals attacked again, driving away the remaining defenders. Federal losses were reported as four wounded. The Federals reported that the Confederate defenders were under the command of Brig. Gen. John C. Vaughn (CS). Vaughn’s brigade was composed of the 16^th Georgia Battalion, the 1^st, 3^rd, 31^st/39^th, 43^rd, 5^th, 60^th, 61^st, 62^nd Tennessee Infantry regiments (mostly mounted), and the 12^th and 16^th Tennessee Battalions. It can be assumed that some of these regiments or men were present during the skirmishing at the end of September and beginning of September.[6]

   There are undoubtedly other skirmishes that took place. As Stoneman’s forces moved through in late March 1865, did the Confederate defenders simply fall back to Zollicoffer or Bristol? What else has escaped the attention of the historian? Jarrett, in his “complete” county guide to the Civil War in Tennessee, only lists dates and sources. No further details. This is one geographical area that needs to be fleshed out a little more.

By the way, if you are interested in the war in east Tennessee and Western North Carolina, please check out my Kirk’s Civil War Raids Along the Blue Ridge.

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[1] Piston, Carter’s Raid, 51.

[2] Judd, The Bridge Burners, 50.

[3] Official Records, Vol. 20, 1:93-94; Jordan, North Carolina Troops, 15:7.

[4] Official Records, Vol. 30, 2:605, 645.

[5] Official Records Vol. 32, 3:475, 533, 831, 835.

[6] Official Records, Vol. 39, 2:558-59; 3:46; 3:907.

The Crab Orchard (Tennessee) and the Civil War

   
There were several places that bore the name of Crab Orchard during the Civil War. Crab Orchard, Kentucky, was probably the most famous, but for this post, we are going to look at Crab Orchard, Carter County, Tennessee. The Crab Orchard in Carter County, geographically speaking, is a rugged area. Near the North Carolina border, the area is split by the Doe River Gorge. It is rough place, but for those looking for hide out and escape, an ideal location. One veteran described it as a “most rugged country…”[1]

   Crab Orchard became a haven for Unionists and dissidents during the war. The area is rough, running through the Doe River Gorge. Nathaniel G. Taylor, a Carter County native who had served in the US House in 1854-1855, and had been outspoken in his defense of the Union during the 1860 election, reportedly fled to the Crab Orchard area following the secession of Tennessee. He was being guarded by 100 Union men. [2]

Crab Orchard section of East Tennessee. 

    After the bridge-burning episode in East Tennessee in November 1861, many of the bridge burners fled to the Crab Orchard area after Federal soldiers failed to support the activities of the local firebugs. Confederate soldiers chased the Unionists for a time, but did not enter the Crab Orchard area. (Judd, The Bridge Burners) An article in a Nashville newspaper reported at the end of November that many of the bridge burners were still in the area: “Some spasms of the rebellion yet exist on the upper borders of the Buffalo, in the Limestone Cove, and the Crab Orchard…”[3]

   William Penland, a sergeant in the 6^th North Carolina Cavalry, was stationed at Mount Taylor, in the Carter County area. He wrote home on January 6, 1863, that he had been on a raid and the rumor was that the “tories in the crabb orchard that was a going to cutt us off if the Yankees whipped us and we had to retreat[.]” Wilson wrote that his command journeyed into the area, but found “none[.]”[4]

   Possibly the biggest movement of troops through the area came in June 1864, when Capt. George W. Kirk moved from Broylesville (then in Carter County), through the area into North Carolina. Kirk was heading to Camp Vance, in Burke County, in an attempt to capture a train to take his raiders east to destroy the bridge over the Yadkin River on the border of Rowan and Davidson Counties. While Kirk was able to capture the camp, along with 200 prisoners, he failed in taking a waiting train at the depot nearby and retreated back into Tennessee, probably passing through Crab Orchard once again.[5]

   North Carolina home guard forces, under Major Harvey Bingham, maneuvered toward the southern end of the Crab Orchard area in October 1864. A group of nine robbed several families in the Bethel community of Watauga County before heading back to Tennessee. Bingham followed with portions of the 11^th Battalion North Carolina Home Guard just over the Tennessee line, capturing one man and driving “off some beef cattle” before heading back to his base.[6] 

Doe River Gorge. 

  The Crab Orchard was also a stop on a local version of the underground railroad, funneling escaped prisoners and dissidents out of the Carolinas and into Tennessee. Keith Blalock, Harrison Church, and Jim Hartley were all pilots on this route, moving from Banner’s Elk through Crab Orchard and then toward Greenville (or wherever Federal lines happen to be holding at that moment).  When Blalock was wounded late in the war while raiding a farm in Caldwell County, a group of fifteen to twenty men came to Banner’s Elk and rescued him, taking Blalock to convalesce at the home of David Stout at Crab Orchard.[7] When George W. Kirk followed Maj. Gen. Stoneman’s Cavalry raiders into North Carolina in March-April 1865, they supposedly moved via Crab Orchard and Banner’s Elk before arriving in Boone.[8]

   This small glimpse of the war inside the Crab Orchard community is just that – a small glimpse. There were many events that took place inside this community that have escaped the pen of the historian and are now lost to history. In Scott and Angel’s history of the 13^th Tennessee Cavalry (US), they write of members of Thomas’s Legion roaming in the area, spreading “terror and dismay wherever they went.” Scott and Angel mention that a man named Andrew Buck “was taken out and hanged until he was black in the face by Walters to make him tell where his sons were concealed.” Outside of saying that Walters was “Captain Walters” from Georgia, who was in Carter County in May 1863, we don’t actually know who this is. Maybe in time we can dig out a few more of these stories and preserve this piece of history.[9] 

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[1] Scott and Angel, History of the 13^th Regiment Tennessee Vol. Cavalry, 380.

[2] Daily Nashville Patriot, August 25, 1861.

[3] Nashville Union and American, December 4, 1861.

[4] http://www.blindpigandtheacorn.com/blind_pig_the_acorn/2010/01/civil-war-letters.html

[5] Hardy, Kirk’s Civil Wars Along the Blue Ridge, 98-108.

[6] Hardy, Watauga County, North Carolina, in the Civil War, 47.

[7] Oshnock, “The Isolation Factor,” 86.

[8] Arthur, Western North Carolina, 626.

[9] Scott and Angel, History of the 13^th Regiment Tennessee Vol. Cavalry, 380-382.