Part 15

As there were no civil officers commissioned by either party in all that section of Virginia, the people naturally turned to Mosby as their only representative of law and order. It was not unusual for them to submit their property controversies to him for decision. In this way he acquired a civil jurisdiction in connection with his military dictatorship. Being a lawyer by profession, educated at the University of Virginia, his civil administration became as remarkable for its prudence and justice as his military leadership was for magnanimity and dash. I heard an old citizen remark, "For two years Mosby was our ruler, and the country never was better governed." He protected the people from stragglers and deserters, who pillaged friend and foe alike. Every captured horse-thief was promptly executed. He required his own men to treat the citizens with fairness and courtesy, and any violation of this rule was punished by sending the offender to the regular service. Its observance was more easily enforced than would appear possible at first glance. The men were scarcely ever off duty, except for necessary rest. The officers were then distributed among them, and by their example and authority controlled, when necessary, the deportment of their men. The citizens with whom they lived also exercised a healthy influence over them. These relations engendered many attachments that ran like golden threads through the soldier's life and outlived the rough usages of war.

It thus became no easy matter to drive the Rangers from a territory so dear to them, and in which they were befriended by all. On two occasions the entire Federal army operating against General Lee passed through Mosby's Confederacy, and yet his men did not abandon it. They hid themselves in the mountains during the day, and descended upon the enemy at night. They thus observed every movement of the Federal army, and all valuable information was promptly sent to the Confederate general. On one of these occasions, June 17, 1863, Mosby found himself at ten o'clock at night between the infantry and cavalry commands of General Hooker's army. Observing three horses hitched near a house, with an orderly standing by, he left his command with the prisoners already captured, and taking with him three men, rode up to the orderly and was informed by him that the horses belonged to Major William E. Sterling and another officer. In a whisper he said to the orderly:

"My name is Mosby. Keep quiet!"

The man understood him to say that he (the orderly) was "Mosby," and very indignantly replied:

"No sir, I am as good a Union man as ever walked the earth."

"Those are just the sort I am after," said Mosby.

Just then the two officers emerged from the house. As they approached, one of the Rangers stretched out his hand to disarm the major. Supposing him to be an acquaintance, Major Sterling offered his hand in return, but was overwhelmed with surprise when informed that he was a prisoner. Upon examination he was found to be the bearer of important despatches from General Hooker to his chief of cavalry, General Pleasonton. These despatches, which developed the contemplated movements of the army and directed the cooeperation of the cavalry, were placed in General Stuart's hands by dawn of day. On this and many similar occasions information furnished by the Rangers proved invaluable to the Confederate generals.

But furnishing information was not the most important service they rendered. It has been fairly estimated that they detained on guard duty thirty thousand Federal soldiers, who otherwise might have been employed at the front. Even then the Federal lines of transportation were constantly being attacked, with more or less success. It was impossible to protect them against such reckless activity as the Rangers were constantly displaying. No matter how vigilant the Federals were, Mosby was sure to find an opportunity for attacking. Sometimes his success would lie in the very boldness of the attempt. This was never more strikingly illustrated than in one of his attacks upon Sheridan's line of transportation. The Federal arm which had driven General Early up the valley beyond Winchester was drawing its supplies over the turnpike from Harper's Ferry. Mosby, taking a command of five companies of cavalry and two mountain howitzers,--numbering two hundred and fifty men,--passed at night across the Blue Ridge, and fording the Shenandoah, halted a few miles below Berryville. Riding out to the turnpike, he discovered in his immediate front two large trains parked for the night--one going toward the army loaded, the other returning empty. He determined to capture the former, composed of one hundred and fifty wagons. At daybreak it commenced to move, guarded by a brigade of infantry and two hundred and fifty cavalry. The train and its guard were soon strung along the turnpike. The cavalry rode on the flank near the center, a company of infantry marched in front of each tenth wagon, and the remaining force was distributed between the rear-and advance-guards. It was a bright summer morning, and just as the sun was rising the Rangers marched across the open fields and halted about four hundred yards from the road, and within full view of the moving train. Observing the Federal cavalry dismounted across the road a quarter of a mile to his left, Mosby sent two companies of his cavalry and one howitzer, with orders to take a position immediately opposite them and there await the signal of attack, which was to be three shots fired from the howitzer left behind. This detachment did not halt until it was within seventy-five yards of the moving train. Of course the Federals observed all these manoeuvers, but were misled by their very boldness; they never imagined but what this new force was a part of their own army. So when the first shot, which fell short, was fired from the howitzer, several of their officers rode to the eminence not more than thirty steps in front of the detached Confederate squadron, and lifting their glasses to their eyes, prepared to witness what they supposed to be artillery practice. Just then the second shell from the howitzer burst in the midst of their cavalry, who, supposing it had been fired in that direction through mistake, hastily prepared to move beyond range. Immediately the rebel yell was raised, and the squadron dashed at the Federals, scattering them in every direction, and capturing the officers with their glasses still in their hands. Turning abruptly to the left, the Rangers charged along the road, riding over company after company of infantry until checked by a volley from the advance-guard. At the same time another squadron had struck the turnpike immediately in front of their first position, and turning to the right, had ridden down everything between them and the rear-guard. Then, with one howitzer playing upon the advance and the other upon the rear-guard, the Rangers rapidly collected their prisoners, unhitched the teams, and burned the wagons. When reinforcements reached the Federals they deployed their skirmishers and advanced in line of battle, only to see the Rangers riding over the hills in the distance, taking with them three hundred prisoners, seven hundred mules and horses, and two hundred and thirty beef-cattle. But the rejoicing of the Rangers was almost turned into chagrin when they learned from the Northern papers that one of the wagons from which they had taken the mules was loaded with an iron safe containing one million dollars to pay off the army. Upon reading it, Mosby dropped the paper with a sigh, exclaiming, "There's a cool million gone after it was fairly earned! What other man could sustain such losses with so little embarrassment?"

But this failure of the Rangers to secure their "earnings" did not always attend them. Shortly after that they collected a sufficient amount of "dues" to enable them to determine upon greenbacks as the future currency of their Confederacy. It happened in this wise. Taking with him seventy-five men, Mosby crossed, at an early hour of the night, in rear of Sheridan's army, and struck the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad above Harper's Ferry, near Duffield Station. Here they prized up one side of the track to a height of four feet, placing a secure foundation under it. Soon the night express came rushing along. The engine upset, and the train came to a stand without serious injury to the passengers. Immediately the cars were boarded, and every one in Federal uniform captured. Among the prisoners were two paymasters, Majors Moore and Ruggles, who had in a satchel and tin box $168,000, in greenbacks, to pay off the troops stationed along the road. Securing this rich booty, the Rangers burned the cars and repassed Sheridan's pickets before the day had dawned. The money was divided upon reaching their Confederacy, each man receiving something over two thousand dollars, Mosby taking nothing.

Only the men who participated in a particular raid were allowed to share in its spoil. The officer who commanded the expedition always controlled the distribution. It was seldom there was anything to divide except horses and their equipments. Those who had distinguished themselves in the fight were allowed the first choice as a reward for their gallantry, the shares of the others being divided by lot. This system, by rewarding individual merit, encouraged a healthy rivalry among the men, and at the same time removed all inducement to leave the fight for plunder. Often when a charge was ordered, a genuine horse-race followed, the swiftest steeds leading the way.

In this manner the men were mounted and equipped without expense to themselves or the Confederate Government. On the contrary, the army quartermaster kept an agent in Mosby's Confederacy, to purchase from the Rangers their surplus stock and arms. His standing price for a horse was forty dollars in gold. But each Ranger retained two or more of the best for his own use. In this way they were always splendidly mounted. I once heard a Federal officer say he was not surprised that Mosby's men rode such fine horses, as they had both armies to pick from. The cavalry was armed with pistols alone, of which each man carried at least two. Their superiority over all other arms for this branch of the service was frequently demonstrated. It is a weapon that can be used with one hand, leaving the other to guide the horse. Cavalry is never really efficient unless trained to rush into close contact with the enemy. To see the whites of their eyes is not sufficient; they must ride over the foe. In the rapid charge the carbine is not only useless, but a positive incumbrance. The saber is comparatively harmless; it serves to frighten the timid, but rarely ever deals a death-wound. Let two men encounter each other in the charge, one relying upon his pistol, the other upon his saber, and the former, though an ordinary marksman, will almost invariably get the better of his antagonist. The Rangers realized their advantage in this respect. It encouraged them to rush into close quarters, where the rapid discharge of their pistols soon told upon the enemy, no matter how bravely they had withstood the onset. I have seen the victory decided alone by the superiority of the pistol over the saber, where the opposing columns had crossed each other in the charge and, wheeling, had mingled in the fight.

But the Rangers were compelled to discard the carbine and the saber for other reasons than their inferiority in the hand-to-hand conflict. It was always their policy to take the enemy by surprise if possible. Their favorite plan was to wind their way through the Federal pickets during the night, and make the attack at break of day. The rattling of the carbine and saber would have made it impossible to execute these movements with the silence necessary to success. To the uninitiated it would be surprising to see with what noiseless secrecy these manoeuvers could be accomplished. Only whispered commands were necessary from the officers, and the presence of danger insured silence in the ranks. This silence, which was observed so long as silence was proper, served to make the charge, with its shout and its cheer, the more terrible to the foe.

But it must not be imagined the Rangers were always successful. They were themselves sometimes surprised, sometimes repulsed. Nothing else could be expected from almost daily encounters in a country abandoned to the enemy. There were occasions when they were saved from total ruin only by their knowledge of the country and the swiftness of their steeds.

A ROMANCE OF MORGAN'S ROUGH-RIDERS

THE RAID, THE CAPTURE, AND THE ESCAPE

I. THE RAID

BY BASIL W. DUKE

In the summer of 1863, when, at Tullahoma, Tennessee, General Bragg's army was menaced by superior numbers in flank and rear, he determined to send a body of cavalry into Kentucky, which should operate upon Rosecrans's communications between Nashville and Louisville, break the railroads, capture or threaten all the minor depots of supplies, intercept and defeat all detachments not too strong to be engaged, and keep the enemy so on the alert in his own rear that he would lose or neglect his opportunity to embarrass or endanger the march of the army when its retrograde movement began. He even hoped that a part of the hostile forces before him might be thus detained long enough to prevent their participation in the battle which he expected to fight when he crossed the Tennessee.

The officer whom he selected to accomplish this diversion was General John H. Morgan, whose division of mounted riflemen was well fitted for the work in hand. Equal in courage, dash, and discipline to the other fine cavalry commands which General Bragg had at his disposal, it had passed a longer apprenticeship in expeditionary service than had any other. Its rank and file was of that mettle which finds its natural element in active and audacious enterprise, and was yet thrilled with the fire of youth; for there were few men in the division over twenty-five years of age. It was imbued with the spirit of its commander, and confided in his skill and fortune; no endeavor was deemed impossible or even hazardous when he led. It was inured to constant, almost daily, combat with the enemy, of all arms and under every possible contingency. During its four years of service the 2d Kentucky Cavalry, of which General Morgan was the first colonel, lost sixty-three commissioned officers killed and wounded; Company A of that regiment, of which Morgan was the first captain, losing during the war seventy-five men killed. It had on its muster-roll, from first to last, nearly two hundred and fifty men. The history of this company and regiment was scarcely exceptional in the command.

Morgan was beyond all men adapted to independent command of this nature. His energy never flagged, and his invention was always equal to the emergency. Boldness and caution were united in all that he undertook. He had a most remarkable aptitude for promptly acquiring a knowledge of any country in which he was operating; and as he kept it, so to speak, "in his head," he was enabled easily to extricate himself from difficulties. The celerity with which he marched, the promptness with which he attacked or eluded a foe, intensified the confidence of his followers, and kept his antagonists always in doubt and apprehension.

In his conference with General Bragg, Morgan differed with his chief regarding the full effect of a raid that should not be extended beyond the Ohio. General Bragg desired it to be confined to Kentucky. He gave Morgan carte blanche to go where he pleased in that State and stay as long as he pleased; suggesting, among other things, that he capture Louisville. Morgan urged that while by such a raid he might so divert to himself the attention of General Henry M. Judah and the cavalry of Rosecrans that they would not molest General Bragg's retreat, he could do nothing, in this way, in behalf of the other equally important feature of the plan--the detention of troops that would otherwise strengthen Rosecrans in the decisive battle to be fought south of the Tennessee. He contended, moreover, that a raid into Indiana and Ohio, the more especially as important political elections were pending there, would cause troops to be withdrawn from Rosecrans and Burnside for the protection of those States. But General Bragg refused permission to cross the Ohio, and instructed Morgan to make the raid as originally designed.

JULY 1863.]

Some weeks previous to this conference, by Morgan's direction I had sent competent men to examine the fords of the upper Ohio. He had even then contemplated such an expedition. It had long been his conviction that the Confederacy could maintain the struggle only by transferring hostilities and waging war, whenever opportunity offered, on Northern soil. Upon his return from this interview he told me what had been discussed, and what were General Bragg's instructions. He said that he meant to disobey them; that the emergency, he believed, justified disobedience. He was resolved to cross the Ohio River and invade Indiana and Ohio. His command would probably be captured, he said; but in no other way could he give substantial aid to the army. General Bragg had directed Morgan to detail two thousand men for the expedition. From the two brigades commanded respectively by myself and Colonel Adam R. Johnson, Morgan selected twenty-four hundred and sixty of the best-mounted and most effective. He took with him four pieces of artillery--two 3-inch Parrotts, attached to the First Brigade, and two 12-pounder howitzers, attached to the Second.

I should state that Morgan had thoroughly planned the raid before he marched from Tennessee. He meant to cross the Cumberland in the vicinity of Burkesville, and to march directly across Kentucky to the nearest point at which he could reach the Ohio west of Louisville, so closely approaching Louisville as to compel belief that he meant to attempt its capture. Turning to the right after entering Indiana, and marching as nearly due east as possible, he would reduce to a minimum the distance necessary to be covered, and yet threaten and alarm the population of the two States as completely as by penetrating deeply into them; more so, indeed, for pursuing this line he would reach the immediate vicinity of Cincinnati and excite fears for the safety of that city. While he intended to prolong the raid to the uttermost, he proposed to be at no time far from the Ohio, so that he might avail himself of an opportunity to recross. On reaching the borders of Pennsylvania, he intended, if General Lee should be in that State, to make every effort to join him; failing in that, to make his escape through West Virginia. Information he had gotten about the fords of the upper Ohio had induced him to indicate Buffington's Island as the point where he would attempt to recross that stream. He deemed the passage of the Cumberland one of the four chief difficulties of the expedition that might prove really dangerous and insuperable; the other three were the passage of the Ohio, the circuit around Cincinnati, and the recrossing of the Ohio.

Before noon on the 2d of July my brigade began to cross the Cumberland at Burkesville and at Scott's Ferry, two miles higher up the stream. The river, swollen by heavy and long-continued rains, was pouring down a volume of water which overspread its banks and rushed with a velocity that seemed to defy any attempt to stem it. Two or three canoes lashed together and two small flats served to transport the men and the field-pieces, while the horses were made to swim. Many of them were swept far down by the boiling flood. This process was necessarily slow, as well as precarious. Colonel Johnson, whose brigade was crossing at Turkey Neck Bend, several miles below Burkesville, was scarcely so well provided with the means of ferriage as myself. About 3 P.M. the enemy began to threaten both brigades. Had these demonstrations been made earlier, and vigorously, we could have gotten over the river. Fortunately by this time we had taken over the 6th Kentucky and 9th Tennessee of my brigade--aggregating nearly six hundred men--and also the two pieces of artillery. These regiments were moved beyond Burkesville and placed in a position which served all the purposes of an ambuscade. When the enemy approached, one or two volleys caused his column to recoil in confusion. General Morgan instantly charged it with Quirk's scouts and some companies of the 9th Tennessee, and not only prevented it from rallying, but drove it all the way back to Marrowbone, entering the encampment there with the troops he was pursuing in a pell-mell dash. He was soon driven back, however, by the enemy's infantry and artillery.

The effect of this blow was to keep the enemy quiet for the rest of the day and night. The forces threatening Colonel Johnson were also withdrawn, and we both accomplished the passage of the river without further molestation. That night the division marched out on the Columbia road and encamped about two miles from Burkesville. On the next day Judah concentrated the three brigades of his cavalry command in that region, while orders were sent to all the other Federal detachments in Kentucky to close in upon our line of march.

General Bragg had sent with the expedition a large party of commissaries of subsistence, who were directed to collect cattle north of the Cumberland and drive them, guarded by one of our regiments, to Tullahoma. I have never understood how he expected us to be able, under the circumstances, to collect the cattle, or the foragers to drive them out. The commissaries did not attempt to carry out their instructions, but followed us the entire distance and pulled up in prison. They were gallant fellows and made no complaint of danger or hardship, seeming rather to enjoy it.

There was one case, however, which excited universal pity. An old farmer and excellent man, who lived near Sparta, had accompanied us to Burkesville; that is, he meant to go no farther, and thought we would not. He wished to procure a barrel of salt, as the supply of that commodity was exhausted in his part of the country. He readily purchased the salt, but learned, to his consternation, that the march to Burkesville was a mere preliminary canter. He was confronted with the alternative of going on a dangerous raid or of returning alone through a region swarming with the fierce bushwhackers of "Tinker Dave" Beattie, who never gave quarter to Confederate soldier or Southern sympathizer. He knew that if he fell into their hands they would pickle him with his own salt. So this old man sadly yet wisely resolved to follow the fortunes of Morgan. He made the grand tour, was hurried along day after day through battle and ambush, dragged night after night on the remorseless march, ferried over the broad Ohio under fire of the militia and gunboats, and lodged at last in a "loathsome dungeon." On one occasion, in Ohio, when the home guards were peppering us in rather livelier fashion than usual, he said to Captain C.H. Morgan, with tears in his voice: "I sw'ar if I wouldn't give all the salt in Kaintucky to stand once more safe and sound on the banks of Calfkiller Creek."