Chapter
One
This is my second book, a historical fiction, inspired by my grandmother's early life during the Civil War Reconstruction.
This book has just been placed on amazon.com. For a personalized copy, contact me at barbandpat66@suddenlink.net
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She picked a fine time to be born. John Brown was hanged that
same year. The army of the Confederacy was forming. The Civil War was to drag on for four years. Abraham
Lincoln had plans made to quickly bring the South back into the fold after the war. Suddenly, Lincoln was dead, and the decision
making fell to the hands of lesser men. Thus, the full reconstruction of the South
was started much quicker, bringing chaos and violence. Had Lincoln lived, Tenny’s
early life probably would have been much different. And there might not have been
a need for this story to be told at all.
We should start this story at
the beginning of the Civil War. Tenny’s father, James Thacker, was a tall man. Long,
lean and supple, wide shoulders narrowed to a small waist. When his steely blue
eyes narrowed, they could strike fear deep into the heart of a man, and send a woman’s
heart a-fluttering. Tenny’s oldest brother Tom was a younger version of his father.
James and Tom had been swept into the war in 1863. James had kept his family clear
of this mess of a war for two years, 1861-1862, scratching out a living on their
remote hill farm in Tennessee. He had no dog in this fight. He had no slaves to
lose, no cotton plantation at stake. But he was a southern man, in the South, and
the winds of war were blowing like a gale. Many men who resisted joining the war
effort were persuaded. Methods used were sometimes not gentle, even for older men,
normally not considered fighting age.
Neighbor John Boles died of natural causes at age fifty five,
in 1863. Son A.H. Boles spoke at his funeral on February 20, l863 – “He was needed
by the family during the stormy days of the war. I cannot understand why he was
taken when so badly needed. In view of the deaths by violent means of many older
men in this part of the country, who chose not to take part in that war, it might
be that our father was spared a violent death. Possibly it was fortunate that he
went in the manner he did.”
It was not uncommon for renegade Confederate soldiers to swoop
down upon a lonely farmer’s cabin, rounding up all men of fighting age who were
not yet involved in the war effort, and, proceed with a hanging. A man does not die instantly from hanging, unless the neck
is broken by the initial shock. By simply
lifting a man, it may well take over five minutes. Being hung for a couple of minutes, and living to tell the tale, has a way
of changing a man’s way of thinking about being in the war. Some resisters were
hung numerous times.
James had never had this experience, though some of his neighbors
did. But James was not a man to be intimidated into anything.
During the first year of the war, 1861, reports began to trickle
in of friends and neighbors who would never return from battle. Into the second
year, they became a flood. Avenging his friends was something James could relate
to. And their land had been invaded. More
and more, this war became his own.
Sarah, Tenny’s mother, was a strong woman. She was average in
height, with long brown hair cascading over her shoulders. She had a few freckles,
just enough, across her cheeks and nose, to accent her beauty. Only a man such as
James Thacker could win the heart of a woman like Sarah. She and the younger children,
Tenny, age six, and Josh, age nine, could survive if the war did not come to their
doorstep. Tenny was a red haired tomboy, full of life. Josh was slim and tall for
his age, and would become the man of the family once the men left. James thought this remote, thinly populated part
of Tennessee was their best chance to avoid the conflict. James began to realize
he had a role in this fight. Late in the second year of the war, he and Tom would
go to war.
James and Tom were now a part of the Tennessee Volunteers, and
they had been in the thick of things for two years, fighting in Tennessee and Virginia.
Losses had been heavy.
Now the war was coming to a close. They all knew it, but nobody
wanted to admit it. They had been able to stay together, in the same outfit, but
they were now on the run. Their army was falling apart. What James really wanted
was to keep Tom and himself alive just a little longer, get this nightmare over
with, and go home to his family.
Atlanta had fallen, late in the war, after a long siege. Now it
was in rubble, and Sherman was marching to the sea. Sherman had said, “The more
cruel the war, the sooner it will be over.” He acted accordingly. His army of 62,000
men left only chimneys standing behind them, living well off the produce of the
South. Nothing was left behind that the rebels could make use of. No food to live
on.
Women and children were now tasting the true nature of war. Letters of desperation from home were causing
hundreds of Confederate soldiers to desert daily. Twisted railroad rails were referred
to as Sherman’s neckties. Sherman’s path
to the sea left destruction and ruin for four hundred miles. His supply train stretched
out behind him for twenty five miles.
Savanna and Charleston were more desperate, even, than Atlanta.
Starvation and death was a way of life. It would be many generations before those
people would begin to forget, much less forgive. It’s not hard, to this day, to
find Southerners there who speak of the war as if it were yesterday, referring to
pre-war, slavery times as the good old days.
Next, Sherman headed north. Richmond, the capitol, had fallen.
Abraham Lincoln had visited Richmond, and had sat at President Jefferson Davis’
desk.
Closer to home, the Union army moved into Tennessee. In fighting
around Nashville, Hood’s army had fallen, and scattered. Lee, in Virginia, had held
Grant off for many months, but his army was shrinking fast. Lee still held out,
although it was said, “Lee’s once proud army has degenerated into a mob.” The North
was now closing in on three sides. Lee’s battered army attempted one more time to
break out. But it was useless. In the nine month standoff with Grant, thousands
of soldiers had left Lee’s army, and gone home, and it was now planting season.
General Lee was surrounded, outnumbered five to one. No hope of getting help; there
was no help left to come.
Lee asked his generals, “What would the country think of me if
I failed to fight on?”
He was told, “There is
no country. Hasn’t been for over a year. To these boys, you are the country.”
“Then there is nothing left for me to do but go see General Grant,
though I would rather die a thousand deaths,” said Lee. So, Robert E. Lee and U.
S. Grant agreed to meet at McClain house, near Appomattox Court House, to end this
war.
The McClain family had lived near Washington before the war. The
first shots at Bull Run had been fired in front of their house, damaging one room.
So they moved to the Deep South, far from the action, near Appomattox Court House.
Here, in their house, Robert E. Lee and US Grant met on April 9, 1865. A surrender
was signed, officially ending the Civil War. Thus the McClain’s could rightfully
proclaim, “The Civil War started in our front yard, and ended in our dining room.”
A group of hungry, ragged soldiers gathered around the tent of
General Lee that night. Most expected they would be imprisoned, at least, or at
worst, killed by the Union army. The general emerged, and stood before his men.
General Lee stated, “Boys, I have done for you the best I can. Now go home. If you
are as good at being citizens as you have been soldiers, the country will be whole
again.”
Riders on fast horses were sent out in all directions, shouting
the news of the ending of the war. One soldier shouted back, “You’re the son of
a bitch I’ve been looking for, these long four years!” While the men in blue celebrated,
those in gray remained silent.
A southern woman proclaimed, “These blue devils have desecrated
our church bells, by ringing them.”
Many could not believe it was over. John Wilkes Booth could not
believe it, either, and for him, it was not. Not just yet. Though he strongly believed
in slavery and white supremacy, he had not yet fought, and was beginning to deem
himself a coward. But he planned to make up for that in one fateful act.
In more remote locations, the fighting still dragged on for some
time. On May 13, 1865, Pvt. Joseph Williams became the last soldier to die in the
Civil War, in the last skirmish – won by the South.
President Lincoln died on May 14 at the hands of John Wilkes Booth.
He was 56 years old. Andrew Johnson was sworn in as President. Three and one half
million men went to war. Six hundred twenty thousand died. Fully one fourth of all
white Southern men of fighting age were dead. Boys went to war; those returning
were old men.
Photography was just beginning to come into its own at the beginning
of the war. Over one million glass plate negatives were made. Many photographers
followed the armies from battle to battle.
Now that it was over, nobody wanted these glass negatives, but they were
salvaged. For the glass. The sun slowly burned those images of unimaginable horror
off the glass in thousands of greenhouses across the country.
When the word reached the Tennessee Volunteers, nobody was more
ready to do as General Lee had instructed than Pvt. James Thacker. He and Tom had
survived the war with no serious injury. Tom was only fifteen when they left home
for war, though he was by no means the youngest. Boys of fourteen were left dead
on the battlefield.
It was time to make their way home. It was to be a long walk.
And, a dangerous one, with all these starving, dispirited men on the roads. A starving
man is a very dangerous man. Another concern was roving gangs of gutter rats; robbing,
stealing, and killing in this now lawless land.
And, James had to help his friend, LaFayette Gilman, get home
to Alabama, somehow. LaFayette had wandered into their camp some time back, starving,
barely able to walk. James and Tom had befriended him, fed him, and nursed him back
to health somewhat, but he was still, in no form or fashion, able to walk to Alabama
alone. Over a period of time, he had related his story to them.
LaFayette was from Talladega County, Alabama. He had been in the
war for all four years. LaFayette was a small man, but with a revolver in his hand,
he stood very tall indeed. He was sometimes quick to anger, but a very good friend
to have. He had knots on his head. Hopefully, not because he was small and quick
to anger. Later, as a lawman in Atkins, Arkansas, he was called Knotty. His grandchildren later called him Little Grandpa.
Early in the war, he had been a cook in his Alabama unit. While
most of his unit was in action elsewhere, his camp came under fire. He and the remaining
men held them off for two days. At the end, only he and two others survived. He
was taken prisoner, held in a P0W camp far to the north for months. He finally managed
to escape in the fall of 1864, and headed south. Ever south. He was far behind enemy
lines, and winter was coming on. He hid by day, traveled by night. He needed food,
and there was none.
Farms he approached were mostly deserted, ravaged, or burned.
There was a good crop of white oak acorns,
and if he could soak the tannin out, they were edible. Time after time, he gathered
up a good batch of acorns. Then he laid over a day or so to crush them, wrap them
in a cloth, and soak them in a running stream for a day. “Not anything I would want
a steady diet of, but better than nothing,” he had said. A couple of times over
the long, cold winter, he did find a farmer or two who could spare him a little
food. Very little. As spring came on, he found a few edible roots. In March, barely
able to walk, he stumbled into a camp of Tennessee Volunteers, and the Thackers
took him under their wing, and saved his life.
They talked it over that night around the campfire. “We gotta’
get away from this place, and we got no horses,” James said. “We got just a dab
of food stored up between the three of us, not likely to find much more anywhere
along this road.”
“Y’all got no call takin’ me along. You best get yourselves home
to family, and get your crops planted. I came this far on my own, I can just rest
up here for a day or two, and I can make it to Alabama on my own,” LaFayette replied.
“You’ve been real good to me, and I can’t ask for more. It’ll work out.”
Tom had been sitting silently, looking into the fire. “I don’t
have no idea how far it is to this ‘Talladega County’ you talk about, but I know
it’s a sight closer to our place. Seems to me you need to go with us, that way we
can help ya some. And besides, three guns are better than two. And, I never seen
a gun shoot as straight as yours does. I know it’ll be slower, but we won’t starve
to death before we get there. You can stay with us a spell, build up your strength,
and go on to Alabama this fall.”
James nodded his head in agreement. “That’s all we can do, LaFayette.
You’re just barely walkin’ and you’ll die here in Tennessee if you leave us.” LaFayette
was silent. He knew they were right. Only he knew just how far it was to Talladega
County. James stood up. “It’s settled, then. We’ll find us a spot away from this
mob tomorrow, pick up the guns we hid out, find a place to lay up a couple of days.
Best to let this starvin’ bunch around here that’ll be headin’ our way get on ahead
some. They’re half starved, but some of them have been able to hang onto their guns,
too, and they can fight. They’ll clear the scum and bushwhackers out ahead of us.
Maybe we can scratch up a little more food. Besides, LaFayette, I hear you’re bettern’
an ole’ razorback hawg’ at diggin’ up acorns. Then, we’ll head for our patch a’
woods.”
LaFayette smiled. “Thanks, fellers’, I know you’re right. An’
I’ll be eternally grateful. Maybe I can return the favor someday. An’ maybe, my
little boy will hook up with yore pretty little red haired gal, too! Ya never know.
There ain’t been no red hair in my line, ever, at least as fer as I know. Kinda’
like to have some. Those red haired women are spunky, ima’ tellin’ ya!”
They laughed. Little did they know just how close he was to speaking
the truth. And nobody, in their wildest imagination,
would ever guess the strange matrimonial twists in store for their families, way
down the line.
At dawn, they were up and moving. James generally knew the direction
of home, from his trip here, nearly two years ago. But they had moved around a lot,
and it would be pretty hit or miss. Maybe, if they just kept pressing a little west
of due south, they would eventually hit familiar country. A couple of miles out,
they moved back off the beaten path a mile or so, and found a concealed overhang
by a little stream. LaFayette was about done in already, and a couple of days rest
would help him.
While LaFayette rested, James and Tom scoured around gathering
up roots and a good bit of polkweed leaves.
“A good batch of polk salit’ will do us all good. We’ll cook up all we can
find, and at least we’ll feel full when we move on. Lord knows, there’s a lot of
that around here. Sure would be nice to have a little dab of hog fat to throw in,
but this’ll do,” said James.
Tom laughed. “Yeah, be nice to have a hunnerd bucks, too, long’s
it ain’t Confederate dollars. But even that wouldn’t do us any good out here, now.”
They returned to the bluff at mid-afternoon, built a small fire
under the bluff trees to dissipate the smoke. They soon had water boiling strongly,
and boiled all the good leaves they had. The very best part was the younger, tender
shoots, and any of the larger leaves showing any hint of purple were discarded.
They knew that was poison.
LaFayette was still resting peacefully. “Well, LaFayette, I guess
we won’t need your acorn gatherin’ savvy too much on this trip. The critters have
about cleaned them all up by now,” Tom observed.
James spoke. “Tom, you had best move over there and keep an eye
out for visitors. I can finish this cookin’ myself. There are a lot of hungry men
around here right now.”
“I can do that,” offered LaFayette. “I may have lost my acorn rootin’ job, and I don’t
wanta’ move much right now, but I can still shoot a man in th’ brown of his eye
at a hunnerd feet.”
LaFayette was a small man, still very weak with a long scraggly
beard, but was deadly with a rifle and handgun. They both knew he was not unduly
bragging here.
The next day, they continued gathering up as many roots and edible
leaves as they could find, cooked them, ate their fill, and packed up the rest for
the road. LaFayette seemed to be feeling better, and was in a more optimistic mood.
No other men seemed to be straying this far off the beaten path, and that was fine
with them. They didn’t have just a whole lot of food to share, anyway. All day long,
LaFayette kept a sharp lookout from his post, while James and Tom worked. It was
April now, and even a shower that blew up late in the afternoon was no problem.
The overhang kept them, and the fire dry and functional.
LaFayette was up at daylight the next morning, declaring he was
ready for the road. So they packed up and moved out, back toward the trail. They
saw few men that day, and it did appear that most who were going in their direction
were well ahead. After eight miles or so, LaFayette was pretty well done in. They
had passed several farms that day, but all were well scavenged or burned, and the
people were gone. They continued, locating a hidden site to camp each day.
Soon, the trail began to play out. There were few signs of men
traveling ahead of them. It seemed few were going in their direction, or maybe it
was just that their own sense of direction was off.
As they stopped to discuss the matter, they heard hoof beats.
Four men were riding directly toward them from the southwest. They checked their
guns. Tom and James carried their army rifles, which they had hidden and managed
to hang onto at the end of the fighting, but with precious few bullets remaining.
LaFayette carried only his holstered pistol, one of the newer repeaters. Fifty yards
out, the approaching men slowed, walking their horses toward them.
“Let them get inside a hunnerd feet or so. James, far left man.
Tom, far right,” LaFayette said very quietly.
The big man who was apparently the leader pulled his horse up
just inside that distance, and the others spread out a little and stopped. “Howdy,”
said the leader.
“Good day, gentlemen,” answered LaFayette. James noted that LaFayette
seemed to be taking the lead role in this, and it appeared he had done this before.
“You gents seem to have slimmed down some in the war,” the big
man said with a snicker.
They were all fully armed, a rifle in their hand, with pistols
in their belts. Their rifles were pointed straight ahead, with the tip down a bit.
“What can we do for you,” asked LaFayette.
“I think we need to take a little look-see inside those packs,”
replied the big man.
LaFayette looked him over for a moment, then answered. “We’ve
been to war for two years, and we don’t exactly carry our valuables around with
us while we fight those damned blue coats. But you’ll play hell, lookin’ to see.”
The big man laughed a mean laugh. “Them’s pretty big words from
a half starved son of a bitch carrying only a pistol, at a hunnerd feet!” The big
man’s rifle tip raised upward; his finger began to tighten on the trigger. A bloody red spot appeared in the middle of his
forehead; they heard the explosion of LaFayette’ pistol. The horses started to jump
and shy away while the remaining three men tried to bring their rifles to bear.
James and Tom’s rifles spoke at the same time, and the one on
the far right jumped from his horse like a squirrel shot off a tree limb. The remaining
two threw down their rifles, tried to control their horses with one hand, and raised
the other high over their head.
“Now wait a minute here!” yelled the far left man. “We don’t mean no harm! Hell, we don’t even know
that big man. He was just ridin’ along with us!”
LaFayette looked at each man in turn. “We all been to killin’
college for years now, and we’re all damned honor graduates. Now gather up your
two buddies and get em’ in the ground, fore’ I lose my temper and ferget I’m way
too tard to dig four damn graves. Now git’ at it!”
As the two men dismounted, LaFayette had a few more instructions.
“No, ain’t no need to load em’ up. Just bury them over there in that soft sand.
You can come get’um later if you want. And we’re plumb tired out with this walkin.’
We’ll need those three black horses over here. And lay all yer guns and gun belts
over there with ‘em. I’d ‘druther not have you two skunks sneakin’ ‘round an ambushin’
us. But you’re in luck. You can double up on that paint pony.”
Shortly, the two men disappeared around the bend on the paint,
and LaFayette looked at each of his companions hard. “Now, which one of you two
sorry son of a bitches missed? Without those horses buckin’ so, two of us would
be dead right now. I figgered’ I could get two, but I was leaving the other two
up to you.” Not a word was said as they mounted up and rode on down the trail.
Half a mile down the path, Tom grinned at him. “We thought we
wuz’ savin’ you. Seems we’re the ones, needin’ th’ savin.’” It was still a long,
dangerous road home. But their chances were looking better. They were on horseback
now.
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