"Morgan's Men - free ebook by Henry Lane Stone

PREFACE

This narrative is printed in pamphlet form to comply with the request of numerous friends and to meet the suggestion contained in the editorial notice of the Louisville Evening Post in its issue of May 29, 1919, as follows:...

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“MORGAN’S MEN.”

“The Evening Post has received a copy of an address delivered a short time ago before the George B. Eastin Camp of Confederate Veterans, by Col. Henry L. Stone, of the Louisville bar, general counsel of the Louisville &amp; Nashville Railroad Company, the address being largely in the nature of a narrative by the speaker of his personal experiences as a soldier in the famous cavalry command of Gen. John H. Morgan. “The Evening Post much regrets that it can not find the space for this exciting

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EARLY TRAINING. ADVOCATE OF STATE RIGHTS.

As already stated, I propose on this occasion to give an account of some of my own experiences as one of Morgan’s Men. A native of Bath County, Ky., when a boy nine years old, I became a resident of Putnam County, Ind., to which State my father removed in the autumn of 1851. In the presidential campaign of 1860, at the age of eighteen, I canvassed my County for Breckinridge and Lane. There were three other young men representing the tickets of Abraham Lincoln, John Bell and Stephen A. Douglas, r

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LEAVING INDIANA TO JOIN THE CONFEDERATE ARMY.

On September 18, 1862, after the battle of Big Hill, near Richmond, Ky., and the occupation of this State by the forces of Gens. Smith and Marshall, I put aside the study of law, bade farewell to my parents, and left Indiana to join the Confederate army. I came to Cincinnati while it was under martial law, passed the pickets above the city, in a countryman’s market wagon, took a boat at New Richmond, Ohio, and landed on a Sunday morning at Augusta, Ky. That day I attended Sunday-school in August

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DUKE’S FIGHT AT AUGUSTA. KY.

This was but a few days before Col. Duke’s desperate fight at Augusta. An incident occurs to my mind here. Ten years later I was Democratic Elector for the Ninth Congressional District, making a campaign in behalf of Greeley and Brown, and Augusta was one of my points to speak. While at the hotel that night, a young man came to my room and that of Hon. John D. Young, who was the Democratic candidate for Congress and traveling with me, and he told us all about the fight of Col. Duke, what a blood

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ENLISTMENT IN THE CONFEDERATE ARMY.

I arrived at Mount Sterling, and set foot “on my native heath,” in Bath County, within a week after my departure from Indiana. On October 7, 1862, I enlisted at Sharpsburg in Capt. G. M. Coleman’s company, composed chiefly of my boyhood schoolmates and belonging to Maj. Robert G. Stoner’s battalion of cavalry, which was subsequently, in Middle Tennessee, consolidated with Maj. Wm. C. P. Breckinridge’s battalion, thus forming the 9th Kentucky Regiment in Morgan’s command. I was appointed sergeant

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THE BATTLE AT HARTSVILLE.

Sixty days after my enlistment our regiment was engaged in its first fight at Hartsville, Tenn., where Col. Morgan won his commission as brigadier general and achieved, perhaps, his most brilliant victory by killing and wounding over four hundred of the enemy and capturing two splendid Parrott guns with more than two thousand prisoners. On the day after this battle, I wrote a letter to my father and mother (the original of which has been preserved), headed as follows: “In camp two miles from Gen

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THE CHRISTMAS RAID INTO KENTUCKY.

On our celebrated raid into Kentucky during the Christmas holidays of 1862 we captured at Muldraugh’s Hill an Indiana regiment of about eight hundred men, who were recruited principally in Putnam County, many of whom were my old friends and acquaintances. I saw and conversed with a number of them while prisoners in our charge, and had my fellow-soldiers show them as much kindness as possible under the circumstances. This regiment had only a few months before been taken prisoners at Big Hill, Ky.

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THE INDIANA AND OHIO RAID.

There are doubtless some here to-night who were on Morgan’s remarkable raid into Indiana and Ohio, nearly fifty-six years ago. The first brigade crossed the Cumberland River at Burksville, Ky., July 2, 1863, when it was out of its banks, floating driftwood, and fully a quarter of a mile wide. The crossing of our twenty-four hundred men and horses was effected by unsaddling and driving the horses into the swollen stream, twenty or thirty at a time, and letting them swim to the opposite bank, wher

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IMPRISONMENT AT CAMPS MORTON AND DOUGLAS.

After our arrival in Cincinnati, we were shipped in box cars to Camp Morton at Indianapolis. I now began to appreciate what it was to be a prisoner of war, and that, too, within forty miles’ of the home of my parents. I was not entirely sure, either, of what would be the fate of a Rebel from the Hoosier State. I was, however, shown much kindness by one of the companies of the 71st Indiana Regiment, which constituted our prison guard. It was made up of my neighbor boys in Putnam County, and they

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ESCAPE FROM CAMP DOUGLAS.

On the night of October 16, 1863, having been confined in prison three months, accompanied by one of my messmates, William L. Clay, I tied my boots around my neck and in my sock feet climbed the prison fence, twelve feet high, between two guards and made my escape. I still have the handkerchief which I tied around my neck and from which my boots swung down my back under my coat, on that occasion. I have it here in my pocket. (This handkerchief was exhibited to the audience.) I have kept it all t

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RECAPTURED IN BATH COUNTY. IMPRISONED IN JAIL AT MT. STERLING.

I reached Bath County a few days afterward, and early one morning I was captured in the very house where I was born by a squad of home guards in charge of Dr. William S. Sharp, who was my father’s family physician when we lived in Kentucky. I was taken to Mount Sterling, and there lodged in jail—in the dungeon. To keep the rats from eating my bread I tied it up to the wall with the chains which were said to have been used in the confinement of runaway slaves before the Civil War. My imprisonment

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ESCAPE AT WINCHESTER.

Having serious apprehensions as to the reception I would meet with at the hands of Gen. Burbridge (who had about that time an unpleasant way of hanging and shooting such Rebels as he caught in Kentucky, having only a short time before so disposed of Walter Ferguson, one of Morgan’s men, whom I knew quite well), I succeeded in making my escape in the nighttime at Winchester, eluding the vigilance of Lieut. Curtis and his thirty mounted guards, who fired a few harmless shots at me as I disappeared

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SOJOURN IN CANADA.

I stayed in Canada, at Windsor and Kingsville, four months. During that winter (1863-4) occurred cold New Year’s Day. I went to a Methodist watch meeting the night before and stayed until after midnight. When I got back to my hotel at Kingsville it was blustering and getting cold fast. The next morning by seven or eight o’clock it was so cold that neither the young man that was with me nor myself could hardly get out of bed. It was eighteen degrees below zero then, and got worse during the day.

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RETURN TO KENTUCKY.

When I prepared to leave Canada, I knew a Confederate soldier was watched by detectives from across the Detroit River. I got on the train from the East as it slowed up and came into Windsor. I do not recall whether it was a Grand Trunk train or the Canadian Pacific, but at any rate I got off the train before we reached the depot, and some detective evidently saw me. When I got out among the other passengers and undertook to get on the ferry boat, he was following me. Thinks I, this won’t do, and

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BACK WITHIN THE CONFEDERATE LINES.

On General Morgan’s last raid into the State, I joined a small portion of his forces near Mount Sterling, having made my way to them alone on horseback from Boone County. By the way, I got my horse—borrowed it, of course—from the enemy. There were a lot of Government horses in the neighborhood where I was at work. On reaching Virginia, in June, 1864, I attached myself temporarily to Capt. James E. Cantrill’s battalion, which was a remnant of Gen. Morgan’s old command, with which I remained until

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SHERMAN’S MARCH THROUGH GEORGIA.

We returned to Georgia in time to follow in the rear of Sherman in his “march to the sea.” Under Gen. Wheeler, as we followed in the path of desolation left by Sherman’s army, we were daily engaged with Gen. Kilpatrick’s cavalry, and for eight days were without bread or meat, living on sweet potatoes alone, the only food left from destruction by the Federal troops. The first meat we ate after this fast was some fresh beef, which we found in a camp from which we had just driven the enemy before t

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THE SURRENDER.

When the news of Gen. Lee’s surrender was received, our brigade was at Raleigh, N. C. President Davis and his Cabinet officers joined us at Greensboro, N. C., and our command escorted them from there to Washington, Ga., where it disbanded. I rode to Augusta, Ga., with Lieut. William Messick, who was from Danville, Ky., and there I surrendered to the 18th Indiana Infantry Regiment, then occupying the city, and received my parole May 9, 1865. Before we were disbanded at Washington, Ga., the remnan

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DARING SPIRIT OF MORGAN’S MEN.

The same restless, daring spirit that actuated Morgan’s men in the field characterized them in prison, and out of eighteen hundred prisoners taken on the Indiana and Ohio raid not less than six hundred of them escaped from Camps Morton and Douglas. I have heard that one of the Chicago newspapers stated during the war that even if Morgan’s men had done nothing to distinguish them before their capture on the raid through Indiana and Ohio, they had immortalized themselves by their wonderfully succe

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INCIDENT ON FERRY BOAT AT COVINGTON.

Getting on the ferry boat at Covington on the Kentucky side, on my trip to Canada, just as it was landing coming over from the Cincinnati side, I saw ten or fifteen steps ahead of me my uncle, Higgins Lane, and my aunt, his wife, from Indiana. He was my mother’s brother, whom I dearly loved, but knew to be an intense Union man. And uncle as he was, I was afraid that he would expose me and have me arrested. I immediately dodged around the boat and did not see him any more. I learned afterward tha

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INCIDENT AT THE ISLAND HOUSE IN TOLEDO.

I may further relate, on that trip to Canada, I stopped at the Island House in Toledo. I thought I would go into Detroit in daylight, and see where I was going when I got there, and crossed the river into Canada. I registered at the hotel mentioned as usual, and went up to supper on the next floor. After I finished and was walking out of the dining room, a fellow stepped up behind me and said: “I guess we will settle right here.” Well, one has to think pretty fast under those circumstances. He i

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COL. GEORGE ST. LEGER GRENFELL.

Most of the survivors of Gen. Morgan’s command remember that brave and gallant soldier, Col. George St. Leger Grenfell, who came to us and was on Gen. Morgan’s staff, after long and faithful service in the British army. He did me a kindness during the war, which I have remembered with gratitude ever since. By an accident my horse’s back had become so sore he could not be ridden, and in the fall of 1862, while leading him and wearily walking in the column over a mountain road in East Tennessee, C

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MAJ. VALENTINE HUGHES STONE.

My brother, Maj. Stone, while in command at Fortress Monroe, requested and obtained from President Jefferson Davis an autograph letter addressed to myself, believing that I would prize it very highly, and delivered it to me at a family reunion at my father’s house, in Carpentersville, Putnam County, Ind., in May, 1866. I still have this original letter in my possession, having placed it in a frame for preservation. It is as follows: Capt. Hy. L. Stone—My Dear Sir: Accept my best wishes for your

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THE COURSE OF EX-CONFEDERATE SOLDIERS SINCE THE CIVIL WAR.

The course of ex-Confederates since the war closed deserves, as a rule, the highest commendation. As far as my observation extends, good soldiers in time of war make good citizens in time of peace. The toils and hardships of army life fit and prepare them for the battles of civil life. The success of ex-Confederates as civilians has been commensurate with their success as soldiers. Kentucky has selected from Morgan’s men some of her highest legislative, judicial and executive officers. From our

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DRY-GOODS CLERK AFTER THE WAR.

I want to say for myself, I got back from the Civil War in the summer of 1865. For four months, I clerked in a dry goods store at Ragland’s Mills, on Licking River, in the east end of Bath County. How much do you reckon my salary was? I got my board and $12.50 a month! I am glad to say I receive, in my present position, a little more than that now....

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SPECIAL PARDON.

After the surrender in April, 1865, President Andrew Johnson issued a proclamation, whereby the rights of citizenship were withheld from certain classes who participated in waging war against the United States Government, among whom were those who had left a loyal State and joined the Confederate Army. It became necessary, therefore, for me to obtain a special pardon from the President, which I did in the summer of 1865, through the aid of my uncle, Henry S. Lane, then United States Senator from

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THE PRESENT AND FUTURE.

Most of us have passed far beyond the meridian of life, but I trust there is much usefulness in store for us yet. We should not content ourselves with the victories and honors of the past. The present and future have demands upon us. The welfare of our respective communities and States, as well as of our common country, calls for our continued labors in their behalf. I shall always remember a remark made by my friend, Jerry R. Morton, of Lexington (one of Morgan’s men, and, for many years after

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