The Western Enterprise and the Mountain Mercury

Monday night I was at Appalachian State (I was there Tuesday night also) systematically going through sources for the book on the 58th NCT. These sources range from their compiled service records which are on microfilm, to family history to historical society newsletters. You never know when a set of letters, or some little tidbit of information will pop up.

I grabbed a roll of microfilm out of the cabinet that was labeled Miss. McDowell Co. Newspapers. I found a real treasure. I was not aware that Marion, in McDowell County, had attempted to start a newspaper during the war.

The first was The Western Enterprise. On this roll of microfilm, they had Volume 1, Issue 1, dated March 14, 1862. It is rare to find the first issue. The paper was published by R. L. Abernathy and E. A. Poe. This issue was extremely hard to read, but had articles on President Davis’s Inaugural Address and a possible treaty with France. The next issue was Volume 1, Number 7, dated April 25, 1862, which contained an article on the battle of New Bern, North Carolina. The last issue on the roll of microfilm was a different newspaper, the Mountain Mercury. This was also Volume 1, Issue 1, dated January 7, 1863. It appears that A. C. Halyburton and William Williams had purchased the Western Enterprise and had renamed the newspaper.

In this solitary issue, C. O. Conley, Captain of Company F, 58th North Carolina Troops, had issued a $180 reward for the apprehension of a group of men that had deserted his company.
I have no other information regarding the Mountain Mercury, no other issues, no idea when it ceased publication. I don’t recall it being on the Guide to North Carolina Newspapers on microfilm before (it’s there now).

It is always nice to find little gems when one is out researching.

For the next few weeks, I’ll be spending a lot of time at App., going through newspapers, more family histories, and whatever else I can get my hands on as I try and wrap up my research.

Names from the 1863 Yancey Baptist Report

After I posted about the resolution Brother Collins had reported on, expressing my desire to know their names, Keith Snipes wrote back. Here are the names. I was hoping to get time to look these men up and see what regiment they served in and how they died. But alas, I just do not have time. I am really behind in my work on the 58th. I am hoping this week and next week to get those last little research trips finished. Then, it will be time for some serious writing. To be honest, the writing part is not hard. Making sure that you’ve got everything (and you never have everything) out there is the time-consuming part.

One other bit of information before we get to those names. When I wrote the history of the Thirty-seventh, if was pretty straightforward when it came to enlistment. For example, William R. Rankin helped put together the "Gaston Blues." On September 24, 1861, 111 men enlisted in his regiment, which would become Company H, 37th North Carolina Troops. Yes, other men would join later on, after the passage of each conscription act, and a few junior reserves. Today, I was working on Capt. John Keener’s Company, which would become Company E, 58th North Carolina Troops. About half a dozen men joined the company before Keener formally began raising a company. On June 25, the day he officially started, 41 men joined. Then, on June 27, another 32 joined. There was one on June 28, seventy-six on July 5, three on July 7, three on July 16, seventeen on July 21, one on July 23, and one on July 25. And, they came from three different counties. My theory is that Keener started recruiting in Mitchell County, then, after he was unable to finish his recruitment goals (largely due to the fact the two other companies had come out of Mitchell County in the two previous months) he went to Caldwell County where he finished recruiting for his company.

Oh well, now to that list of names. These are men from Yancey County who were Baptists that died prior to August 1863:

A. Hollifield; William Collins; J. McKinney; William Woody; William Byrd; G. W. Byrd; Daniel Quinn, Ansel Randolph; Bartlett Wilson; E. J. Buchanan; William Grindstaff; J. M. Robertson; John Robertson; J. D. Howell; Thow McKinney; James Willis; James Harris; H. Willis; John Beaver, and Milas Hollifield.

E. Kirby Smith bio

Don recently asked what bio on E. Kirby Smith I am planning to read. I have a copy of General Edmund Kirby Smith, C. S. A., written by Joseph H. Parks. It was published in 1954 by LSU and reissued in 1982. I did some searching, and I could find no other recent bio on Smith. I do not know if I will get to read the whole bio at this time. Too many books... I know, that smacks against one of my favorite quotes from C. S. Lewis - No book too long, no cup of tea too large.

With the way that books on the war are turned out, I find the task of trying to read them all daunting. I have about 1,000 books on the war, and many more on Appalachia, early American history, and literature. Add to that a smattering of religious texts and biographies, books on Scotland, histories in general, WWII, Korea, Vietnam, and philosophy. I’ve also got around 200 books printed prior to 1860 - once again history, literature, text books, biographies, state laws and codices, etc.,

If you add the books that belong to my wife, (she’s an English professor), that includes just about anything ever written by or on C. S. Lewis, and enough Shakespeare to keep a person busy for a lifetime. Well, I really need a bigger house with lots of wall space for book shelves.
Some of these are good books, some bad.

Maybe a list of my favorite War Between the States books is in order.

This past Saturday morning, I was digging around at my local library, and I found a book entitled A Baptist Looks Back by James Oliver Young. It is a history of sorts of the Baptist Associations in the Toe River Valley area, i.e., Yancey, Mitchell, and Avery Counties, with a little McDowell and Buncombe thrown in. In my search I found that in 1863, Elder S. M. Collis "was asked to furnish a list of names of..." the soldiers who had died since the beginning of the war so that the Association might enter them into the minutes. Collis does this, then adds:

The above Brethren were members of the Baptist church and had been ornaments to the denomination to which they belong and when they came up under a sense of duty to their country they turned their backs upon their families and their breast to the cannon, bidding adieu to wives and children, fathers and mothers, the most of them having little families to mourn their loss. Some of their bodies lie in around Richmond, Va., and some around Gettysburg, Pa., while others of them fell in Mississippi. Peace to their silent dust and honors to their memories. The Association tenders her heartfelt sympathies to the bereaved fathers and mothers, wives and children, yet would not sorrow as those without hope, believing that the are resting in heaven where war will disturb them no more.
How many thousand widows
Bereft of husband brave
How many thousand orphans
With fathers in the grave
The Father’s seat is empty
‘Twas never so before
The brother’s voice is silent
And shall be heard no more.

I don’t think that I can add anything else....

The Slave Who was a Soldier...

Folks - I found this recently in the Charlotte Observer. I was kind of surprised.

Regards,
Michael


THE SLAVE WHO WAS A SOLDIER: DAUGHTER SEARCHES FOR TRUTH
Memorial will honor man who fought for Confederate Army

Cliff Harrington Wary Clyburn is a local Civil War hero I bet many of you don't know about. He's a former slave who fought for the Confederate Army from 1863 to1865. He was born in Lancaster County but moved to Union. Many of his descendants live in the Wingate area, and they're planning to honor his memory next month. Pension documents confirm that Clyburn was a former slave and a Civil War veteran. The documents say he volunteered for the Confederacy with Capt. Frank Clyburn, who was the son of the man who owned Wary Clyburn (Note: The documents spelled his first name several ways: Werry, Weary and Wary. His daughter says the correct spelling is Wary).

According to the pension documents, Wary Clyburn served as the bodyguard for Frank Clyburn in Company E of the 12th regiment. Wary carried Frank on his shoulders to rescue him during intense fighting. Wary also served as a special aid to Gen. Robert E. Lee.

Monday morning I met Mattie Clyburn Rice of High Point; she's the daughter of Wary Clyburn. She had come to the Heritage Room at theOld Monroe Courthouse to get information about her father. She already had a good bit of documentation. That's where I saw the documents that had been filed when Wary wanted to get pension payments as a Civil War veteran. Clyburn did get his pension in 1926, and after that many other former slaves also got pensions, according to his daughter.

Mattie Clyburn Rice was born in 1922 and her father died in 1930. Rice said her father spent a lot of time telling her about his life. He was too old to work in the fields."He would send my brothers to the fields and he would stay with me," she said. "He would tell me about his life and I didn't have any computers or anything, so I had to remember all of this. I kept it in my head and I've been looking and searching."

When she became an adult, she left Union County but continued to look for information about her father, including a search for the site where he was buried. Mattie Clyburn Rice said she found her father's grave about 10 years ago. It's in what we now know as Hillcrest Cemetery.

She didn't have time to show me the exact spot Monday. However, when the discussion turned to her father, a big smile lit her face. She loved her father and that has driven her to gather information.

Even now, she wants to know more. There is a photo of Wary Clyburn, but his daughter didn't have it with her. She had a photocopy. It showed a man with a grand smile, seated with what appeared to be his Confederate military jacket on. He was holding a fiddle.

Mattie Clyburn Rice said when she was small, her parents took her to First Church of God on Morgan Mill Road. In her search for information, she again has found the church and that's where the family plans to honor Mr. Clyburn on Aug. 26. There will be a family reunion.

The obvious question is this: Why would a slave volunteer to fight onthe side of people who held him in bondage?That's a question that only Mr. Clyburn can answer. Too often when it comes to the Civil War and slavery, we hear versions of the truth that are woven from conjecture and narrow perspectives. It's refreshing when you find the truth. This is it. Wary Clyburn was a brave and loyal hero. And he deserves to behonored by all of us. IN MY OPINION

The Memorial Wary Clyburn will be honored Aug. 26 during a reunion of his
descendants. The ceremony will be at First Church of God, 301 MorganMill Road.

GOT INFORMATION?Mattie Rice Clyburn is still compiling information about her father. If you have information, please write to her: Mattie Rice Clyburn, P.O. Box 1503, High Point, NC 27262.

I had a great time this past weekend at the Franklin reunion in Linville Falls. I had a chance to talk to many people who had ancestors who served in various North Carolina regiments, and it was great to meet all of them.

I’ll be speaking tonight at the Col. John B. Palmer Camp of the Sons of Confederate Veterans in Burnsville. Next Monday, I’ll be speaking at the SCV Camp in Haywood County - they meet at the fire department in Clyde. On Tuesday, I’ll be at a book festival in Rutherfordton, at the historic church there - St. John’s I believe.

Still researching more than I am writing. The researching should come to an end very soon, even though I’ll still be on the hunt until the day I turn in the manuscript.

For the past few days, I’ve been trying to tackle the whole conscription event. Conscription is largely the reason for why we have a 58th North Carolina.

I’ve searched through a lot of books trying to gain a better understanding, including:
Weitz - More Damning than Slaughter

Trotter - Bushwhackers
Inscoe and McKinney - The Heart of Confederate Appalachia
Hilderman - They Went into the Fight Cheering
Wert - "Confederate Conscription Woes" CWTI
Johnston - Zebulon Vance Papers
Yearns and Barrett - North Carolina Civil War Documentary
Thomas - The Confederate Nation
Yearns - The Confederate Congress
Rable - The Confederate Republic
Moore - Confederate Conscription
and
McPherson - The Battle Cry of Freedom

I am no fan of McPherson. However, it is in the latter that I found this:

The main purpose of conscription was to stimulate volunteering by the threat of coercion rather than by its actual use.

That is just what happened with the 58th NCT. One company, the Mitchell Rangers, already existed. Another, the one from Caldwell County that was recruited for Vance’s Legion, was a by-product of conscription. Eight other companies (there were twelve in the 58th NCT) were recruited prior to the cutoff date for volunteering. The last two, L and M, were made up of conscripts, forced into service.

I wonder if any of the other regiments mustered into service after April 1862, follow this same steps? All I need is yet another project.

You might have noticed that I have changed my photograph on the above header. Before, we had the Confederate monument in Greensboro. Now, it is the Monument to Women of the Confederacy on the capital grounds in Raleigh. I took this photograph last summer. The monument was dedicated in 1914.

Yesterday, I ventured to Boone, researching on the 58th NCT. I wanted to make sure that I missed nothing in my research. I came away with a few dates and middle names, but not much more. I used to work at this library, almost a decade ago, and I went through the collections pretty thoroughly. Plus, I went through them when I wrote the history of the 37th NCT and my history of Watauga County.

I have yet another busy weekend. Tomorrow, I am going to hear Dr. Anne Whisnant, who wrote a history of the Blue Ridge Parkway. I have a research trip to Burnsville on Friday morning, then I will be at the Franklin family reunion in Linville Falls Friday night and Saturday. I am taking a display on the 58th NCT. There were several members of the Franklin family who served in the 58th NCT, so maybe I will come away with some good stuff.

Often, in the many talks that I give, I get questions regarding the pro-Union sentiment of the mountains of western North Carolina. I often tell folks that western NC was not as pro-Union as the "historians" have made it out to be. I’ve been preaching that sermon for a decade now. Western North Carolina, especially in the first year of the war, was more pro-Confederate than the rest of the state - more mountaineers joined the Confederate army in the first year of the war than men off the mountain.

Another thing that I often talk about is three different groups all battling against each other in western North Carolina. Today, I up that number to four. In answer to an email that I received, here is my response:

No one could "live open" during this time. You have the Confederate home guard (after mid-1863), doing their best to police the area, and round up conscription dodgers and deserters. Then, you have groups of regular Confederate soldiers who swept into the area from time to time. These groups were usually worse than the deserter bands, impressing men into service and stealing whatever they could. You have the deserter bands, men who have illegally left the army and have formed themselves into armed bands who prey upon a largely defenseless civilian population. Lastly, you have individuals or family groups that use the war as excuses for carrying out acts of violence on their neighbors. This would later transmit into the "family feuds" that color writers would exploit later in the 19th century (i.e., the Hatfields and McCoys).

Well, that sounds like the outline for a book.

What do you think?

Reading on Braxton Bragg

I started my reading this past weekend on Braxton Bragg - are there any "good" books on Bragg? I’ve started with the two-volume Braxton Bragg and Confederate Defeat.
I recently finished Contested Borderland: The Civil War in Appalachian Kentucky and Virginia. by McKnight - loved it! Just wished there had been a little more about the military campaigns that affected the socio-economic outlook of the area.

I also read War at Every Door: Partisan Politics and Guerrilla Violence in East Tennessee 1860-1869 by Fisher - I really liked this book also. I took lots of notes

Lastly, I’ve read The Terrible Time: The Civil War in Kentucky’s Bell, Knox, Laurel, and Whitley Counties by Taylor - I really wanted to like this book. I spend a lot of time in this area. Alas, there is not really anything here that cannot be found online for free. Plus, a full third of the book is reenactorisms. I’ve reenacted for over 25 years; I think I know how to load a musket.

After Bragg, I plan to read the bio on E. Kirby Smith.

58th update

Gloomy day here in the mountains of western NC. It seems that we have tried to make up for our year-long rain deficit in the last couple of days.

If you have emailed me in the past couple of weeks, please be patient - I am getting to them as fast as possible. I think I sent close to one hundred emails in the past week. I’ve probably still got one hundred to go.

I did take time last night to actually work on the 58th NC book. I took chapter 3 and dropped it onto the bottom of chapter 1. Chapter 2 stayed the same, and the new chapter 3 is all about Vance’s Legion. Chapter 4 deals with the actual formation of the regiment. Chapter 1 now gives background on Colonel Palmer, the bridge burners, and the formation of the Mitchell Rangers. Chapter 2 backtracks and covers some of the foundations of why we had a war, especially from a North Carolina point of view.

Chapter 4 should not be too difficult - just a lot of names and dates and brief county histories.
I’m still having a hard time trying to divide up chapter 5. This chapter, time wise (at least in my mind), covers from August of 1862, when the 58th North Carolina arrives in east Tennessee, until September 1863, when they leave and join the Army of Tennessee in time for the battle of Chickamauga. While the regiment did not fight in any battles, they did move around a lot. Plus, probably 50 percent of my primary sources fall within this chapter. Once the regiment joined the AofT, they wrote fewer letters. Original letters are such treasures, and it’s so great to tell the story in the soldiers’ own words that I like to use as much of this material as I can.

What to do about Vance's Legion....

For most of you who have been reading this blog for some time, you know that I’ve taken an interest in Vance’s Legion. Now I’m trying to decide what to do with the information that I’ve collected.

In the spring of 1862, Col. Zebulon B. Vance came up with the idea of recruiting a Legion. A Legion is an organization composed of Infantry, Cavalry, and Artillery. His motivation behind the Legion seems to solely be gaining a brigadier general’s star. Maybe that’s not quite a fair assessment, but that is the way it comes across in Vance’s correspondence.

Once gaining approval from the Confederate officials in Richmond, Vance began to run into problems. Vance had assumed that he would be able to get help from the governor in Raleigh - NOT! - They were of different political persuasions, and since Vance had not sought their approval, they turned a deaf ear to the young colonel. Vance assumed that he would be able to get companies already formed and in the training camps around Raleigh - NOT! See above for the reason.

Vance was facing a tight deadline regarding the Conscription Act. He basically had thirty days to finish his recruitment for his Legion. However, Vance could not even secure a pass from his commanding officer to allow him to go and recruit himself. Lastly, there were other people out recruiting, taking (not on purpose) men from the areas that Vance was most popular - his former 10th Congressional District, in the mountains of the western part of the state.

In the end, Vance was only able to recruit four companies for his Legion, three of infantry and one of cavalry, before his time ran out. The Legion failed, not only because it never met its recruitment goals, but because the idea of Legions became unpopular with the Confederate high command. Those four companies joined other regiments.

That leads me to this: I’ve come up with enough primary sources (there are almost no secondary sources) on Vance’s Legion to put together a small booklet on the organization. Say maybe 30 or 40 pages, with a roster. Would anyone out there be interested in a book on a group that never really existed?

Please drop me a line and let me know. I would probably self-publish the book. I’ve written eight books and have always worked with traditional publishers. The self publishing route would be a different road for me. I’m interested in your feedback!

blogging

Yesterday, I answered about 35 emails concerning the 58th NCT, and two concerning the 37th NCT. I am trying hard to get the emails from my recent genforum posting caught up. If I have not answered yours yet,please be patient. Yesterday's emails brought a smattering of birth and death dates, a couple of obits, and three post-war photographs. I am glad to have every one.

Richard Williams at Old Virginia Blog wrote a great posting on civility in the blogging world. I'm thankfully on his "safe list." However, it led me to think about my own blogging habits. Most bloggers have long lists of other people's blogs. I don't. Not that I don't find everyone else's ramblings of interest. I try really hard to put up only the blogs that I have time to read. I am a full-time writer, and the time that I spend sitting here I try really hard to devote myself to the craft. Otherwise, I'm either sitting in my big leather chair reading, or I'm spending time outside, or with my family. I started to teach my six-year-old to play chess yesterday.

Well, I guess it's time to get back to that email pile. I think I still have about 70 emails to go.

This past Saturday, I had the privilege of going out with a fine group of folks to place VA grave markers on the graves of Confederate soldiers in Mitchell and Yancey Counties. The group later went on to Madison County, but I was not able to go with them. Our first stop was the old Bakersville Cemetery. We placed a new marker on the grave of Albert N. Marker. Next, we marked for the first time (save for a rock) the grave of John F. Baker. Baker died during the war in a hospital in Bakersville, North Carolina.

The group then took off for the Bear Creek Cemetery, where we replaced the broken grave marker of William Duncan.

Next, we took off up Rebel’s Creek to place a centotaph for John Howell. That is the large group photograph. The fellows in suits are from the SCV Camp in Blountville, Tennessee, and one of them is related to Pvt. Howell.

Finally it was off to Yancey County and the Silver Cemetery, where we placed a marker for W. Alexander Silver. Silver died in Yancey County in 1862, and we believe that he is buried here in this cemetery near his parents.

That is when I had to leave the group and head for the Toe River Storytelling Festival. As usual, I have far more to do than I have days on the calendar!

I started a new blog yesterday. It is called Glimpses of Avery County and is a place to show off some of my local photography.

Last night, at 11:57pm, I finished posting the names all 2,003 men who served in the 58th North Carolina Troops on genforum. This project has taken weeks - I’ve posted the names of the soldiers, along with where they were from, when they were born, and in what company they served. I did this with the book on the 37th North Carolina Troops I did several years ago, and I had really good results.

I have already had really good results this time around. I’ve acquired several good family stories, several unpublished photograph, and an unpublished diary from Caldwell County. So, it has already been worth the time that it is has taken me to get it done.

I’ve got a couple more local research trips before I can get back to seriouss writing. I’ve been trying to find a way to divide up chapter three, which covers January to July 1862. I think I am going to pull out the information on Vance’s Legion and make it a separate chapter and move the current chapter three to chapter four.

Well, time to go to work. If you sent me an email in the past week, I’m going to start trying to answer them today.

Richmond is a hard road to travel

What a trip - I left home Wednesday morning at 11:00 am, and got back home Thursday afternoon at 12:45 pm. I drove to Ashland, Virginia, did a program for the Hanover Metal Detecting Club, spent the night, and came home. My six - year old son has caught a bug, and I needed to be at home by 1:00pm so Elizabeth could go to work. This is not the quickest trip to Richmond that I’ve ever taken. Once, when we were in grad school (before kids), we day tripped from Boone, NC, to Richmond. We were poor, and could not afford a room, so we left early one morning and drove to the area (I think it was on a January 2, maybe 1996 or 1997), and visited a few of the attractions - I remember the Poe Museum. We then ate, and drove home - that is 12 hours on the road, plus a full of day of battlefield and museum tromping.

I’ve been working on this site - what do you think? I’ve added another topic line to the right - what I’m reading right now. I’m reading War at Every Door for research purposes. The other book, Science of the Founding Fathers- is for fun. I thought about a column for books that I’ve purchased recently. I’ve picked up the new book on Lee by Pryor, Atlanta and the War by Garrison, and a history of Wise County, VA, and the War. I had never heard of the book by Garrison. It was published in 1995, and I got it for $5 in a used book store in Berea, Kentucky.

I didn’t mind not having much time in the Richmond area for this trip. I really don’t enjoy battlefield tromping with the temps 90+.

I really enjoyed seeing some of the treasures of the Hanover Metal Detecting Club. It is nice to know that some of these artifacts are being rescued from construction sites.

All this just to say...

A couple of days ago, I wrote a paragraph, a nice long one, on the bridge burnings in east Tennessee and their connection to the formation of the first company of the 58th North Carolina Troops. This was for my book on the 58th NCT. Sometimes writers spend a lot of time setting up a scene - like the bridge burnings, just to say something might have happened. I discovered this when putting together my book on Watauga County. I spent over a page writing about the causes of the Spanish-American War and the recruiting process for local men, just to sum up the section by saying that these recruits never got into the war.
The same might be said for my research into Vance’s Legion. Off and on for the past month I’ve been researching this group - an organization that never really existed.
I’ve often wondered why the 29th, 39th, 58th, and 60th North Carolina regiments were sent to east Tennessee, and later the Army of Tennessee or other western commands. The 29th NCT was sent in direct response to the bridge burnings. Not sure about the 39th NCT and 60th NCT yet. The 58th NCT was sent to attempt to secure the area and help stem the tide of men leaving east Tennessee for Federal regiments in Kentucky.
This afternoon, I’m off the Virginia to speak to the Hanover Metal Detecting Club at the library in Ashland.

New Book - Just Released

Folks - I am happy to announce the release of my eighth book - Remembering Avery County: Old Tales from North Carolina’s Youngest County, published by the History Press of Charleston, South Carolina.

Remembering Avery County picks up where my Avery County pictorial history, released in 2005, left off. When one puts together a pictorial history, one is confined to a small amount of words for each photograph. So many of those people in those photographs have amazing stories and that is what this book does - tells stories. There are twenty-five essays in this book (along with forty plus photos) that tell the story of Avery County’s past, like biographical information on the county’s namesakes - Waightstill Avery and William C. Newland, Jr. You can find information on Howard C. Marmon, designer of the car that won the first Indy 500 and who lived in Pineola; Lulu Bell and Scotty, who were national radio personalities and helped preserve mountain music; Keith and Malinda Blalock, who ran an underground railroad through the area in the 1860s. There are also essays on mining, railroading, Grandfather Mountain, and the Land of Oz.

The book has also gotten its first good review. Check out what Scott Nicholson wrote in the Mountain Times at http://www.mountaintimes.com/mtweekly/2007/0628/hardy.php3

I am taking orders - you can obtain a signed copy of Remembering North Carolina’s Confederates for just $22.00. Checks or money orders can be sent to PO Box 393, Crossnore, NC 28616. I will also be doing some local book signings in the very near future. I hope to see many of you at an upcoming event!

I got an email from a friend a couple of days ago. He is interested in a group of Georgians stationed along the coast of North Carolina in April 1862. One of the soldiers wrote a letter headed "Bivouac of the N. C. Battalion, near Elizabeth City, N. C., April 24th 1862." It is believed that the letter was written from the Richardson’s Farm or Richardson’s Mill area. Does anyone know to what NC Infantry Battalion the writer is referring? It is not the 2nd North Carolina Battalion - they had all been captured and sent home on parole. Another clue - The Georgia writer also writes "that after the evacuation of Norfolk and Portsmouth, this battalion marched to Petersburg with Huger’s Division"

Does anyone have any idea to whom the writer was referring? I told my friend that I’d throw this information out and we’ll see what comes back in. I’m looking forward to seeing what surfaces!

Delap Family Cemetery

I’ve spent the past few days on "vacation" in east Tennessee and Kentucky. I know many people would not consider the constant tramp through battlefields, museums, and cemeteries as much of a vacation - but it is the only way I know. Last Friday, I revisited the Delap Family Cemetery in Campbell County, Tennessee.

For those of you not familiar with this story, here are portions of an article that I wrote two years ago:

North Carolina Confederate Soldiers Honored at Last.

On a recent warm and humid Saturday morning, more than 250 people gathered on a hilltop in LaFollette, Tennessee. They were there to honor a group of long-lost Confederate soldiers. Many of those soldiers were from the mountains of western North Carolina.

In the summer of 1862, these soldiers marched away from Grasslands, the estate of Col. John B. Palmer. The soldiers who left for war that summer represented some of the oldest families in the area, and they joined for many reasons: personal and family honor, desire to "see the world," and fear of conscription.

The regiment was the 58th North Carolina Troops. Their destination was garrison duty in east Tennessee. The first winter for these soldiers, 1862 to 1863, was a difficult one. Over sixty men from the 58th North Carolina perished far from their mountain homes. They died not from battlefield wounds, but from a host of diseases, including measles, typhoid, and even dehydration from intestinal viruses. Since their encampment was described as being "near a spring," it is possible that they were exposed to contaminated water. Those who succumbed were buried in a local family cemetery and, for the most part, forgotten.

But there were a few local residents who remembered the cemetery. Eighty-four-year-old Alice Coker learned about the cemetery from its caretaker, Bob Delay, in the 1960s.

In 2003, Watauga County native Leta Cornett, whose grandfather had served in the 58th North Carolina and met his death in camp that winter of 1862-1863, stopped by the Campbell County Historical Society and Museum and inquired about the location of the burial ground. She was directed to Coker.

Ms. Coker quickly identified the cemetery, grown up with trees and thorny bushes after years of neglect, as the long-lost burial ground of the 58th North Carolina. Historical societies and government agencies from across Tennessee and North Carolina quickly became involved, and the cemetery was cleaned and restored. Tombstones were ordered from the Veterans Administration....

I wrote several articles about the cemetery, many of which were published in local newspapers and in the Carolina Confederate. Sadly, the story of these Confederate soldiers is not well known out of Campbell County, Tennessee, and western North Carolina.

This was my first trip back to the cemetery since the memorial service in June 2005. I wanted to take a few pictures without all of the people milling around. The photograph above was one of those that I brought home, along with all the food, baby clothes, and zucchini that my wife’s relatives loaded into our car!

I’m having a rather restful July Fourth before heading down to our little community celebration this afternoon. It’s a great little event with plenty of fun photo opportunities and chances to visit with the public. I always look forward to it.

More on the bridge burners

A few days ago I advanced a theory on the bridge burnings in east Tennessee as being an impetus behind the formation of the Mitchell Rangers. I spent some time at the library reading through North Carolina newspapers trying to find a public reaction to the event. I found almost none, mostly just reprints from out of state newspapers.

The burning of the railroad bridges in east Tennessee was the idea of Rev. William B. Carter, a Tennessee native. Carter took the idea to the commanding generals in Kentucky, including Sherman and Thomas, and then on to Washington, where he received the blessings of McClellan, Cameron, and Lincoln. Carter then returned to Kentucky, and then east Tennessee.

The idea was to organize small bands of east Tennessee loyalists into groups that would burn nine railroad bridges between Bristol, on the Virginia-Tennessee line, to Bridgeport, Alabama. Then, a Federal force would march to Knoxville and capture the city and gain control of the railroad, a vital link between Virginia and the deep South.

November 8, 1861, was the date set for the attacks. Just hours before the attack, Gen. William T. Sherman, whose support for the operation had been tenuous, pulled his support and ordered General Thomas not to advance. Of course, word could not be sent to Carter and his bridge burners. They proceeded to destroy five of their nine targets.

Unaware that the Federal soldiers had abandoned them, large numbers of loyalists turned out in different counties. At Elizabethton, not too terribly far from Mitchell County, an estimated 1,000 loyalists gathered, organized themselves into companies, elected officers, and stockpiled supplies. Confederate re-enforcements quickly arrived and the loyalist bands dispersed. Several of the actual bridge burners were arrested, tried, and hanged.

On November 18, 1861, North Carolina Governor Henry T. Clark sent a note to Secretary of War J. P. Benjamin, stating that he had two regiments on hand that were asking to be sent to the area to protect their own families. One of those regiments was the 29th North Carolina Troops, under the command of Col. Robert B. Vance.

As far as North Carolina reaction, there was an article in the newspaper from Asheville, stating that Confederate forces in east Tennessee had driven 500 (or 1,000) loyalists out of Tennessee and into Madison County, North Carolina. The folks in Asheville were obviously concerned, even though the loyalist figures were greatly exaggerated.

So, while I have no hard proof that the Mitchell Rangers were organized as a direct response to the bridge burning episode, I do think that there is a substantial circumstantial case.

Your thoughts?