Aot - 1865

[larry_cockerham]

At Bentonville, Palmer's command consisted of the 58th and 60th North Carolina, the 54th and 63rd Virginia and a detachment of several consolidated Tennessee regiments under Colonel Anderson Searcy. The 58th North Carolina numbered less than 300 effective troops, but was in both better and stronger condition than Palmer's other regiments.

Joseph B. Palmer, now promoted to brigadier general, in command of the brigade, was chosen to lead the assault. Palmer's attack, initially successful, but bogged down, was relieved by Pettus' Brigade, which took the lead. The Federals regrouped in a reinforced position, and Palmer's Brigade again joined the front lines with the 58th North Carolina on the left of the battle line, the 63rd Virginia toward the center. The fight got thicker as evening progressed, and the lines thinner and the Brigade found itself nearly encircled, but held position until 8 p.m. when firing ceased. About midnight of March 19, the brigade withdrew, and reformed for battle in the morning of the 20th.

 

[larry_cockerham]

March 21, 1865 Bentonville is a wrap

From Judge Frank H. Smith in 1904:

The Last Consolidation.—

In North Carolina, March 21st, 1865, in the final death gasp of the Confederacy, the Third Tennessee Consolidated Regiment was organized; it was composed of the 4th, 5th, 19th, 31st, 33rd, 35th, 38th, and 41st, Regiments of which James D. Tillman was commissioned Colonel in the Brigade of Brig. Gen. Joseph B. Palmers. Maj. Gen. B. F. Cheathams Division, Lt. Gen. W. J. Hardees Corps, and Gen. Joseph E. Johnston, Commander.

Note the listing of the 41st TN Infantry in this consolidation of the AOT. Sergeant Thomas Hamilton Janes of the 41st, ancestor of Camden Blake Cockerham was likely in this group.

 

[larry_cockerham]

From the History of the 11th Tennessee Infantry:

By March, Captain F. F. Tidwell commanded the 11th/29th Tennessee Infantry Consolidated. The regiment participated in one final engagement, the Battle of Bentonville, North Carolina on March 21, 1865. In the conflict, the 11th/29th Tennessee was held in position near the Mill Creek Bridge at Joe Johnston's headquarters. The men, much fatigued from hard marching, fell back with Johnston and his staff before a spirited attack of the 64th Illinois Infantry. This attack was eventually stymied. In this, the final battle in which the 11th Tennessee participated, Sergeant James R. Weaver of Company B and Private J. H. Larkins of Company E were both wounded

 

[TerryB]

John W. DuBose's book is now online. He gives an account of who was the last Confederate killed serving in the AOT.

 

[larry_cockerham]

John W. DuBose's book is now online. He gives an account of who was the last Confederate killed serving in the AOT.

How, pray tell, did he know he had the right man?

 

[TerryB]

How, pray tell, did he know he had the right man?

DuBose was with Wheeler and the action he describes is a cavalry skirmish on April 1, if I remember correctly. His book details his own service with Wheeler. No doubt some men may have been killed on the way home in various mishaps, but DuBose was pretty confident of his account.

 

[TerryB]

Here's the link. The account is on p 455. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924030918100

 

[larry_cockerham]

We're here to learn. It's folks like you who make that possible. Thanks.

 

[M E Wolf]

This may be interesting:

Southern Historical Society Papers.
Vol. XXXII. Richmond, Va., January-December. 1904.
Confederate Diplomacy.
The Opposition Our Representatives Faced in Europe.
MR. JOHN WITHERSPOON DuBOSE REVIEWS THE FAILURE OF
CONFEDERATE DIPLOMACY.
He Appears to Think that the Result May Have Been Different had the Masterly Statecraft of the Hon. R. Barnwell Rhett been Adopted--The Queen, Prince Albert, Palmerston, Cobden and Bright for the North, and the Negroes, while the Tories Warmly Approved the Cause of the South--The Status of France and the Views of Napoleon--Sharp Criticism of President Davis and His Cabinet.
[From the Sunday News, Charleston, S. C., July 17, 1904.]
Was it ever before that a nation at its birth was ready with a million young horsemen to ride across its borders as Forrest and Morgan and Mosby rode, gathering arms and blankets and horses for wider range of unparalleled enterprise in the enemy's territory? Was ever invaded nation firm in its foundations to drive back the million young horsemen from the farms of the South!

When Robert Barnwell Rhett in masterly statecraft, at the outset, would prepare compensatory treaty rights for the commercial powers of Western Europe in Confederate ports, thus to hold them safe from hostile blockade; and when this measure of statecraft was refused by the Confederate government, the act of refusal became tantamount to the use of a policy of military defence of thousands of miles of Southern coast, impossible of success, yet a policy wherein the Confederate soldier was shorn of his peculiar prowess in war and whereby an exhaustive draft was made upon the army for garrison forces.

The government of the Confederacy lost no time in entering a field of diplomacy of its own devising, a sentimental appeal to an unwilling world. The Confederate States made prompt advances for admission of the most refined free government that had ever lived into the family circle of hereditary monarchies, but it brought in its pure hands no temptation to the avarice of the old monarchies. It appeared with long scroll of argument in its pure hands, going to prove to ancient kingdoms that the only hope for free institutions in America lay in the length and safety of its own precious life. That was all of Confederate diplomacy--all, from first to last, brief as the time.

The young slave republic, the offspring of a dismembered government at peace with all Europe, and which, if let alone, would go, full sail, into the sphere of monarchial conditions--the young republic mounted the pedestal of natural right, and with the curl of virtuous scorn upon its lip challenged the monarchial world to turn from the spectacle if it could!

FOUR EMEMIES OF THE SOUTH.
Lord Palmerston, the Whig premier of England, an octogenarian, who had been a personal disciple of Wilberforce in his youth and who had brought down to his present life and office the enthusiasm then inspired by the great emancipator, heard with a smile of incredulity the solemn plea of the Confederacy at the Court of St. James. John Bright and Richard Cobden, the venerable premier's lieutenants, had hardly composed themselves from the exciting sympathy with which they had watched the campaign Abraham Lincoln for the Presidency. The German Prince-Consort, too, Albert, was near to carry into the predicate of Confederate recognition the national German morbidity of hate against slavery.

Albert died soon, yet not before he had developed his stand for the side of the United States in the American conflict. For years after her husband's death, the Queen lived in a melancholy, and he would be a rash minister who should approach her Majesty with suggestion of variance with her dead husband's known policy.

THE QUEEN FOLLOWS ALBERT'S PREJUDICES.
It was not new or recently excited prejudice that the Confederacy met at the Court of St. James. The amiable Victoria in her happiest years had been offended to hear the truth of the Southern States. She had retired from her household the chosen companion of her childhood, the constant associate of her domestic life and the favorite among her four maids of honor, Miss Amelia Murray. The tale so simple, now so ominous, had been long told to the world. Miss Murray made a tour of the United States, from North to South, accompanied alone by her English maid. She came in the time of the Kansas agitation and being informed in public affairs, wrote voluminously in private letters to friends in England of party politics as she observed them in Congress and elsewhere. She wrote critically of American society, its customs and the sectional lines that separated what was good North from what was good South. Gradually approaching slave States, the tourist accepted proffered hospitality of the planters and visited plantations. The tone of her original Wilberforce an prejudices began to moderate as information reached her mind of practical conditions concerning the Southern plantation and its African bondsmen. The truly valuable letters of Miss
Murray were published. The delightful literature proved an offence in the Royal Court. The revelation of truth on the Southern plantations published from the household of the Queen of England whose government, directed by her husband, was even then engaged in vigorous efforts to put down the surviving slave trade in English bottoms with Spanish-American islanders and Brazil, was bad politics. Not only so, but the Queen's government had a rule to enter upon no new treaty of amity and commerce which failed to commit the signatures alike to suppression of the African slave trade. Miss Murray's published reports of Southern plantations were an unwelcome information and must needs suffer a positive royal repudiation in her dismissal from the semi-political post she had so long adorned. The Southern Confederacy, nevertheless, had already taken the most advanced step open to it against an indefinite expansion of the institution of slavery. The Secession Convention of Alabama had led in the movement which culminated in a proviso of the Federal Constitution forever forbidding the introduction of slaves into the Confederacy from any foreign country whatsoever.

THE TORIES WERE WITH US.

But the Palmerston ministry resolved from the outset upon an unfriendly policy toward the Southern Confederacy. The Tory party, dividing almost evenly with the Whigs, met the ministry on the issue. The London Times earnestly supported the Tories and the South. At Liverpool, Manchester and in London voluntary associations of the higher classes were formed to express in practical methods their sympathy with the South. Rich men offered money to army hospitals of the Confederacy, competent writers published paragraphs and authors wrote bound volumes arguing for the South, members of Parliament from their seats prodded the ministry for its shirking policy toward the South. The Tories were as much our friends as if they had been of us, on the land.

While the Southern sympathizers in England were thus busy in practical ways at home, they did not fail to approach Napoleon III in their urgency of the Southern cause. The Emperor of France was a willing listener. He took up the cause of the South through formal channels of diplomacy with England. He held interviews with English members of Parliament, committing himself to the most advanced suggestions of co-operation with their own Government for the recognition and support of the independence of the Confederacy. He urged them to force the British ministry to favorable action.

Robert Barnwell Rhett, deputy from South Carolina, had given the subject of Government for the South the study of an acute and philosophic mind for more than the life of a generation. He took his seat at Montgomery well prepared with an outline of foreign policy for the young republic which he had done so much to make possible. Mr. Rhett's suggestion was founded upon certain accomplished facts of daily experience in the relations of the commerce of the slave States to European trade. The export commerce of the slave States in raw material was the richest in the world. The official report of the fiscal year ending June 30, 1859, gave the exports initiating in the slave States at $188,693,490 and the exports initiating in the free States at $5,281,091. England was both the chief ocean carrier and the chief manufacturer of the main subject of Southern commerce, cotton. The industries of France were also largely involved in the carrying trade and the manufacture of Southern raw material.

THE RHETT SCHEME.
Upon the demonstrated value of Southern commerce and the historical record of Southern civil and military character, Rhett's object of a foreign diplomacy rested. The Rhett scheme was, to proceed without a moment's delay to assail the well-known and-slavery prejudice and fanaticism of the Palmerston ministry on the moral aspect of Southern slavery with an irresistible temptation of treaty stipulation into the interest of English commerce and manufactures known to be generally controlled by Whigs and abolitionists. The Rhett scheme would pledge the trade of England and France special advantages and privileges in Confederate ports; for example, a tariff rate for twenty years, not to exceed 20 per cent. ad valorem, and certain fixed port charges not to exceed the cost of maintenance. It was not pretended that the suggestion of special and compensatory terms of commercial treaty in the premises was original. On the contrary, the terms were recommended as proven by the treaties of the United States with France and England in the revolution.

The policy of Rhett was a practical confronting of an emergency; the refusal of his policy without a substitute in any degree was a sentiment without an apology.

Did the rejection of Rhett's scheme of foreign alliance give promise of any uncommon exertion of vigor in the Confederate government within the limits of its own resources? The inexplicable situation was laid open by the act of rejection, the diverting of the Federal government of seceded States from control of the political school that had long resisted the invention. Secessionists had called the government into existence upon an argument all their own; Unionists immediately rose to the administration and held it firmly until the end. Perhaps an intrepid spirit for hazards revealed itself in the conduct of the men who had been loth to the last moment to enter upon so daring an enterprise as the erection of the new republic. It is enough to say the leading secessionists of 1860-'61 lost control of the Confederate government at the outset. If discernment was to be used, if opportunity was to be seized, if influence was to be reckoned on, the founders of the Confederacy had no voice in the situation. Whether the road to the Confederacy was straight or devious, the one significant thing was, it led to the goal which the road builders were denied.

continued

 

[M E Wolf]

Southern Historical Society Papers.
Vol. XXXII. Richmond, Va., January-December. 1904.
Confederate Diplomacy. CONTINUED

CALHOUN TRUSTED DAVIS.
In the last months of his life, John C. Calhoun, seeing the end of his own availability approaching, prophesied that the young Senator from Mississippi, then on crutches from the field of Buena Vista, would be the master spirit in the ripening movement to confederate under one government the slave States. Calhoun died in the belief that the Senator intended his eloquent defence of the right of secession and his eloquent portrayal of the perils which beset the slave States should lead to the remedy of secession. But the President of the Southern Confederacy never approved the secession movement. Mr. Davis was, perhaps, never quite understood.

The hand of the Confederate government denied the predicate of preference to the men from whose brains and hearts the Southern movement had been nourished into complete system. In the years of opportunity from foreign diplomacy, the Secretary of State was Judah P. Benjamin, a Whig and Unionist in the period when tariffs and free trade were contending American theories; the Secretary of War was James A. Seddon, by whose order General Johnston was retired from command, the second army in strength then destroyed, and Seddon had been earnestly opposed to the formation of the Confederacy long after President Davis took the oath at Montgomery; the Secretary of the Treasury, Christopher G. Memminger, was a lifelong and active opponent of the Calhoun doctrine and he was put in office against the declared judgment of the President that Robert Toombs, secessionist, was the ablest financier among all American public men. It is not worth while to say these officers were all faithful; they were all failures. The axiom remains unimpeached, that statecraft is the intellectual product of an ideal. Without the ideal there is no statecraft. Statecraft involving the efficiency of the Confederate war office did not suggest John A. Campbell for Assistant Secretary of War, yet Campbell held the place until the end in the time of his avowal to the President that he had no sympathy with the motives of the Confederacy. (Letter of Campbell to Judge Curtis.) The Senator from Georgia, Benjamin H. Hill, was notoriously the friend and counsellor of Mr. Davis, yet within thirty days of the meeting of the Confederate Congress at Montgomery, Mr. Hill had denounced bitterly the Southern movement. There was never a day when he either expected or desired the Confederacy to live. (Life and Speeches of B. H. Hill, by his son.)

RHETT, YANCEY AND WIGFALL.
Neither text-page or index of the five octave volumes prepared by Mr. Davis and his wife, purporting to relate the tale of the rise and fall of the Confederacy and the parts acted by many persons, contains the name of Robert Barnwell Rhett, William L. Yancey, Louis T. Wigfall and their associated secessionists. The massive volumes leave a perfect hiatus between the lucid accounts of the incorporation of the States' rights principle in the Federal system of the United States and the application of the principle in the perfected Confederate government. Who prepared the people through long years of public discussion, and what the motive' of final action, the many books omit to tell. We are denied the simplicity of facts, for the gratification of a patriotic desire to find the men and their motives who built a government which sought to live among the nations.

YANCEY'S FRUITLESS MISSION.
In March, 1861, the Confederate commissioners in Europe, Wm. L. Yancey, President, and F. A. Rost and A. Dudley Mann, Associate Commissioners, with their accomplished young Secretary, Mr. Fearn, of Huntsville, Ala., sailed out of the port of Charleston. Orders were obeyed. Mr. Yancey made Southern rights' speeches and all talked to the kind people who received them into their confidence, of the inherent virtue of the Confederate cause. Yancey had no confidence when he left home in his mission. "Don't go to Europe, if you value your reputation," his friends warned him. Having exhausted the field of his instructions, he asked to be called home. The request was reluctantly granted by his government. He was too fluent a talker to be spared. The others remained. Mr. John M. Mason, long a distinguished Senator from Virginia, and Mr. John Slidell, a native of New York, long a Senator from Louisiana, were sent out to the Court of St. James and St. Cloud respectively.

MASON AND SLIDELL.
The two commissioners, their respective secretaries, and the family of Mr. Slidell, passed uninterrupted through the blockade at Charleston and at Havana boarded her Britanic Majesty's mail ship Trent, plying between Vera Cruz, Mexico, and Southampton. Mr. Seward, Secretary of State, had determined from the beginning of the war to bluff England and alarm her ministry. Among the first of his unrelaxing acts in this line was the capture of Messrs. Mason and Slidell under the British flag on the high seas off the coast of Cuba. Seward held his finger firmly on the pulse of Palmerston's timid government. When the time came, he surrendered the commissioners to a British ship in the harbor of Boston, and in February, 1862, they were landed at Liverpool.

Early in February, 1862, Mr. Mason delivered informally Secretary Hunter's message to the British ministry. There was absolutely nothing in it beyond the stale argument Yancey had left behind him, that secession was not revolution in the American system, that the Southern people were not in rebellion; that the success of the South in the war was inevitable; that the Southern people would never return to the Union; that there were vast stores of cotton on the plantations, which an enterprising neutral could have for the asking. In the retirement of his later years President Davis recounted the success of the first commissioners, as he had anticipated success, in these words:
"Our efforts for recognition by European powers, in 1861, served to make us better known, to awaken a kindly feeling in our favor, and cause a respectful regard for the effort we were making to maintain the independence of the States which Great Britain had recognized and her people knew to be our birthright." (Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government, Vol. I, p. 469.) This, after contemplation in fact, comprehended the whole scheme of Confederate foreign diplomacy from first to last.

TORIES WELCOMED MASON.
The Tories of England received Commissioner Mason with open arms. They flocked to his apartments to welcome him and to applaud his country. They escorted him to a seat in the galleries of Parliament, that he might hear with his own ears how they prodded the ministry and shamed it. They carried him to their country homes to see their kennels and their stables and to look upon their balls. "They are the same people here as in old Virginia," wrote Mason to his wife. The Lord Mayor invited him to attend the grand annual dinner. He was there called upon to speak and his speech was tumultuously applauded.

Commissioner Mason took up the question of blockade with the English ministry, to the limited extent that the ministry would hear him. England had insisted that the Confederate States should informally accede to the Paris Convention; and this Paris Convention had committed the powers that signed it to the proposition that: (1) Blockade by belligerents must be effective; (2) That blockade once raised, even for an hour, could not be restored without notice to neutrals.

THE BLOCKADE INEFFICIENT.
Mr. Mason showed to the British minister conclusively that in the second year of the war the blockade of the Confederate ports was not effective; that a lively trade continually passed through the blockade, so called; that, for instance, 100 vessels and more had passed through the Confederate ports laden with incoming and outgoing merchandise in the three months only of the winter of 1861-62. The commissioner further showed the British Secretary for foreign affairs that in lieu of a port blockade which it had failed ignominiously to maintain, the United States government had established a line of patrol ships at sea in front of the various Confederate ports, and that the captures of several neutral vessels, made in their attempts to trade with the Confederacy, were actually captures made upon the high seas, and not in the harbors or within the Confederate jurisdiction. These, therefore, were unlawful prizes and were a direct insult and injury to neutral commerce.

SLIDELL AND NAPOLEON.
Meantime Commissioner Slidell was active in Paris. He persuaded M. Thouvenal, the French Secretary of Foreign Affairs, to obtain permission from the Emperor for Messrs. Lindsay and Roebuck, members of the British Parliament, to see him in the interest of the Confederacy. The Emperor cheerfully received the visitors, Mr. Slidell also being present. The interview was prolonged at the Emperor's insistence. He authorized the Englishmen to prepare Parliament for any advanced movement in favor of the South, even to a break up of the Whig government that stood in the way, and he would promptly and effectively join it. Mr. Lindsay explained at length to the Emperor that the battle of the United States was not really for the maintenance of a Union from which slavery should be eliminated, but for the maintenance of a Union which would abolish the revenue tariff and in lieu restore the Clay-American system, or protective duties for the benefit of the commerce and manufacturers of the North. He showed that as imports are paid for by exports, and as the imports of the South were great and of the North small, the South really paid three-fourths of the Federal revenues, only to be denied an equitable disbursement of the collection. The Emperor admitted the probable correctness of Mr. Lindsay's views, and reiterated his readiness to join England in recognition of the Confederacy at once and to sustain that proceeding at all cost. "Why not advance to that step alone, may I ask your Majesty?" inquired Lindsay. "Ah, what then becomes of my fleet off Vera Cruz?" was the reply.

While the commissioners were thus employed Moncure D. Conway, a Virginian of extraordinary ability, who had in his youth gone North to enlist with Garrison, Phillips, Mrs. Howe and the most radical of the abolitionists, advertised in London that he would lecture in that city under the auspices of Mr. John Bright, and that the object of his lecture was to give moral support to a party in the United States that would rise up and coerce the Lincoln administration, to stop the war, and concede the independence of the Confederacy. Conway sent Commissioner Mason a ticket to his lecture.

THE BLOCKADE TWICE BROKEN.
Again and again the Confederate Commissioners urged upon England and France the rights of their governments under the terms of the Paris Convention. It was shown that now in the third year of the alleged blockading, Flag Officer Ingraham, of the Confederate navy, had attacked the blockading squadron off Charleston, destroyed some of its vessels, and entirely dispersed the others from view. The next winter, it may not be amiss at this place to say, Captain Dixon and crew ran the submarine torpedo boat Hunley, the first boat of the kind known to naval warfare, under the blockader Housatonic, a powerful warship, off the harbor of Charleston. The Housatonic and all on board, about 400 persons, went to the bottom, carrying the Hunley, with it. Every blockader, taking fright, fled, and the port was open for several days. At the same season in which Ingraham opened the port of Charleston, Semmes opened Galveston. But neither England or France enforced the terms of the Paris Convention. In the winter of 1862-63 the improvised navy of the Confederacy destroyed eleven warships of the United States, while the Alabama and the Sumter drove the merchant marine of the enemy off the high seas.

PRESSING NEED FOR FIREARMS.
Among those in high place, early impressed with the importance of foreign sympathy and trade, especially in the matter of procuring arms for the Confederacy, was the first Secretary of War, General Leroy Pope Walker. The Secretary suffered a rare experience. He was so beset by importunate captains of companies to receive their commands into the army that he found it essential to his personal comfort to reach his office in Montgomery by the back way to avoid the importunities of the soldiers. He made a requisition on his government for 150,000 foreign rifles, but was shut off with 25,000. The government did nevertheless promptly select a purchasing agent, and ordered him to Europe with full discretionary power to buy arms and army equipments. The person selected was an old army officer, who had been detailed as drillmaster and commandant at the University of Alabama, a young man, Captain Caleb Huse, of Massachusetts. Captain Huse was a graduate of West Point, and a good soldier, but citizens and prudent soldiers thought General Beauregard, with a competent staff, must have been a more serviceable officer to have sent abroad on so vital a responsibility.

continued

 

[M E Wolf]

Southern Historical Society Papers.
Vol. XXXII. Richmond, Va., January-December. 1904.
Confederate Diplomacy. CONTINUED

As the sequel proved, when General Joseph E. Johnston, soon after the First Manassas, proposed to invade the North as the necessary strategy of war, President Davis assured him the War Department had not the arms needed. The President said, with apparently deep feeling, that he "had tried to get arms, but had failed, and he did not know when he could get them. So about the same time, when General Albert Sidney Johnston, had recruited and put in camp ten or twelve thousand volunteers for the Western army, the Secretary of War ordered the camps broken up and the men returned home for want of arms. In all that time, and for months after, Capt. Huse was receiving only $250 or about that sum, a month from his Government to use in his duty, but having made known to friends of the Confederacy in London his urgent need, Sir Isaac Campbell loaned him half a million dollars on his private account and his cargo of much needed arms sailed.

The Confederacy needed a currency and manufactured one. Did the abortive effort fairly represent the opportunities of' the government? There was much of foreign sympathy rejected in the proceeding. We shall see that "cotton" bonds of the Confederacy, marketed in England and France were almost 100 per cent. higher than the bonds of the United States at the same period. I well remember that Vice-President Stephens in conversation remarked to me, in the war time, that the Confederacy with a little more business tact in the finances, might establish "the strongest paper currency in the world," referring to the uses that might be made of credit, founded on cotton, by the Treasury Department.

"COTTON OBLIGATIONS."
The Confederate cruiser Alabama, was built for the government at Birkenhead, on the Mersey, by a firm of Laird, a member of Parliament, was a member. The cost was $250,000 and the firm rejected offers from the Secretary of the Navy, at Washington, to build several war ships for the United States. They would have built others for the Confederacy, because it paid good prices.

In September, 1862, Commissioner Mason wrote to his government that twenty or twenty-five millions could be had for its uses for "cotton obligations." Now the income of the 'United States, in 1860, was about $75,000,000 only. At a single draft our government was able to command one-third that sum. "Cotton obligations" of the government consisted in a simple pledge of honor to deliver so many pounds of lint, at a price named, at a convenient seaport within the Confederate limits, within three calendar months after the arrival of peace. So attractive to foreign money lenders were the "cotton obligations" that Mr. Erlanger, of the private banking firm of Erlanger & Co., Paris, made his way through the blockade to Richmond to urge the authorities there to sell large blocks of this character for gold delivered in London.

TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY THOUSAND "UNION" HESSIANS.
The Union States, pending these incidents of Confederate financiering, was selling bonds in Germany and devoting the proceeds to bounties to German subjects to enter its army. Approximately a quarter of a million stout Germans flocked to save the Union upon their bounties. At the same period the United States had agents in Ireland recruiting soldiers to come to the rescue of the Union on promise that the scanty farm at home, crippled with tithings and landlords exactions, should be replaced with many fruitful American acres as a free gift. Then, too, to fill out the quota of soldiers, school teachers and others of both sexes came from New England to Southern rice and cotton plantations to recruit negro troops, and of these some 241,000 were armed and mustered into the ranks of the Union army. What the United States bonds brought on the market in Europe is immaterial. They sold as low as 40 cents on the dollar in Wall street.

THE SOUTH BORROWS $15,000,000.
Under date "Richmond, January 15, 1863," Secretary of State Benjamin wrote to Commissioner Mason: "The agents of Messrs. Erlanger & Co. arrived a few days before your dispatches and were quite surprised to find their proposals were considered inadmissible. They very soon discovered how infinitely stronger we were and how much more abundant our resources than they had imagined. We finally agreed with them to take fifteen millions instead of twenty-five millions which they offered." The 7 per cent. bonds of the government were taken at 77. The Secretary said the government took the money really because Mr. Slidell advised the step to assist the negotiations for recognition of France. At that very time, when the government wanted no money, the Ordnance Department was drawing the copper to make percussion caps from old distillery outfits in North Carolina and the commanding generals stood aghast at the long line of shoeless, ragged men in their ranks.

The Erlanger loan was placed in London with immediate and astonishing success. March 3, 1863, Mr. Erlanger had returned and the first offering of $5,000,000 appeared on Lombard street. Before the day closed $10,000,000 had been subscribed and the premium was 5 per cent. When the aggregate of bids for the entire loan of $15,000,000 was summed up $75,000,000 had been subscribed.

PRIVATE BLOCKADERS.
The government, now endeavoring to make order, sent Mr. Colin J. McRae, a successful cotton factor of Mobile, to Europe as its financial agent. McRae soon sent home a protest against the neglect of his government in failure to make proper control of the blockade running business. He found the Liverpool market fairly well supplied with cotton, brought through by private enterprise. He earnestly urged that the government should take charge of the blockade running and control the commerce to its own advantage. He gave as one reason for his counsel information that much cotton escaped the blockade direct for the port of New York.

Two splendid iron ships of war for the Confederacy were completed on the Clyde by Captain Bulloch. The other brother, Captain Bulloch (both uncles of President Roosevelt) arrived in London to take command of one, for work against the enemy, and Commodore Matthew F. Maury arrived to take command of the other. Ambassador Charles Francis Adams discovered the approaching readiness of the ships to put to sea. The American minister again played his old game of bluff successfully. He at once called on Earl Russell, her Majesty's Secretary for Foreign Affairs, and demanded the sailing of the ships should be promptly forbidden. The banker, George Peabody, agreed to put up the $5,000,-000 gold that Russell required, to indemnify his government, and the ships were thrown out of the Confederate possession at once, before leaving their docks. All ships building in Europe on account of the Confederates then ceased. The Southern cause was dead in Europe.

GETTYSBURG AND VICKSBURG.
General Lee returned from Pennsylvania upon a drawn battle and General Johnston lost Vicksburg in the same days of midsummer in the third year of the war. Confederate sympathizers in England grew despondent. The Southern people did not grow despondent, nor did the army for a moment lose faith in the final outcome of the war. It is a notable fact that the battle of Gettysburg did not come within the plans of Lee, and would not have occurred at all had Lee's order to the marching van of his army been duly executed. Gettysburg village did not lie on his line of invasive march. It was reached by the turning of a head of corps in the van at right angles to the prescribed course from headquarters. And the movement was a surprise to the commanding general. Not less notable an instance of disobedience of orders from Johnston was the retreat of a wing of his army into Vicksburg and the resultant siege and inevitable capitulation that followed.

OTHER CONFEDERATE AGENTS.
Several young men were sent abroad to excite the good will of foreign people toward the government of the Confederacy and its people. Major Norman S. Walker, of Richmond, was placed at Bermuda to receive and forward merchandise both ways. Mr. Henry Holze, some time one of the editorial writers of the Mobile Register, was sent to London in a confidential government office. Mr. Edwin de Leon, a noted newspaper paragraphist, was sent to England with $25,000 to purchase, if need be, space in important journals for the discussion by him of the Southern situation for the better enlightenment of the public as well as the government. Various other citizens were sent abroad on missions of the government from time to time.

After the cruiser Alabama began upon her wonderful work on the high seas, the neutrality promised by Great Britain at the outbreak of the war languished. The United States continued to get all the support it needed from English trade, while the corresponding benefit was denied to the Southern Confederacy. Both belligerents were negotiating for the construction of war ships by British builders when the Alabama was launched, yet after the war England paid losses inflicted by the cruiser on Northern commerce to the sum of $15,000,000.

We have seen that the South did in fact face a frowning world. While the government lived, to the latest moment of its life, the proud spirit of its Chieftain was burdened with no doubt or the shadow of a doubt. In the period of his vicarious sacrifice that followed the fall, his memory stands forth in the splendor of dignity, truth and valorous endurance incarnate.

 

[M E Wolf]

Last men/man killed in the CSA:
Southern Historical Society Papers.
Vol. XXV. Richmond, Va., January-December. 1897.
Malvern Hill--July 1, 1862.
[excerpt]
CHARLES CITY CAVALRY.
In the carefully written and full report of General Magruder, he refers to the Charles City Cavalry as follows:
"The brave and devoted troopers of the Charles City Cavalry were on this, as on all other occasions, distinguished for the promptness, intrepidity, and intelligence with which they discharged their important duties; and to their chivalric and enterprising lieutenant, Hill Carter, Jr., I owe a public acknowledgment of the great services he has rendered his country on every occasion which has presented itself."

It may not be inappropriate to remark that this company, to which General Magruder refers, lost the first man killed in battle in the war; for Samuel W. Pryor had been killed in a skirmish below Bethel church, the Confederate line, and was sleeping in his family burying ground in Charles City county, before Wyatt fell at Big Bethel in June, 1861. It also lost about the last man killed in the war; for its gallant first lieutenant, William H. Harwood, who had passed through every cavalry fight of his command, and been engaged in as many hand-to-hand encounters as any man in the service, fell pierced through by a cannon ball, in the desperate charge on General Gregg's brigade, the day before the surrender at Appomattox.

Benjamin H. Harrison was captain of this company at Malvern Hill. Magruder thus refers to him:
"The noble, accomplished, and gallant Harrison, commander of the Charles City Troop, uniting his own exertions with mine, rallied regiment after regiment, and leading one of them to the front, fell, pierced with seven wounds, near the enemy's batteries."

[end of excerpt]
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Southern Historical Society Papers.
Vol. XXV. Richmond, Va., January-December. 1897.
Rockbridge Second Dragoons.
A Short History of the Company--Its Roll.
[From the Richmond, Va., Dispatch, June 6, 1897.]
Mr. J. Scott Moore contributes the following to the Rockbridge county News:
The Rockbridge Second Dragoons was organized in the lower end of Rockbridge, principally in the vicinity of Brownsburg, and was mustered into service April 21, 1861. The officers at that time were John R. McNutt, captain; Robert McChesney, first lieutenant; John A. Gibson, second lieutenant; Dr. Z. J. Walker, third lieutenant. They were ordered to West Virginia (then Virginia), where Lieutenant McChesney was killed, probably the first man killed on Virginia soil. His tragic death occurred near St. George, Tucker county. Lieutenants Gibson and Walker were promoted to be first and second lieutenants by vacancy, and John Y. Anderson was made third lieutenant.
[excerpt]
This company holds undisputed the unique position of having probably the first and the last man killed on Virginia soil. Lieutenant Robert McChesney was the first, being bushwhacked in West Virginia, and James H. Wilson and Samuel B. Walker were killed at Appomattox on the 9th of April, 1865, several hours after the terms of capitulation had been signed by Generals Lee and Grant.
[end of excerpt]
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Southern Historical Society Papers.
Vol. XXV. Richmond, Va., January-December. 1897.
The Cumberland Grays, Company D.
Twenty-First Virginia Infantry.
[From the Richmond, Va., Dispatch, September 18, 1897.]
Its Roster, with Brief Record of its Service.
CUMBERLAND C. H., VA., September 11, 1897.
There was a reunion of the Cumberland Grays' Association at Cumberland Courthouse recently. This company was commanded first by Captain F. D. Irving, who was in command of it from the 1st of July, 1861, to the 21st of April, 1862, when he refused reelection and retired from service.
[excerpt]
The following is a list of those who were killed or died since and during the war:
[[[Roster]]]]
[excerpt]
PRIVATES
[[roster]]
King, George H., was the last man killed at Gettysburg in his company, a few yards from the enemy's line.
[end of excerpt]
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
continued

 

[M E Wolf]

Southern Historical Society Papers.
Vol. XXVIII. Richmond, Va., January-December. 1900.
Charlotte Cavalry.
A Brief History of the Gallant Command.
ITS RECORD A SPLENDID ONE
From Its Organization to the End of the War, in the Charging Squadron. With Roll Added.
[From the Richmond, Va., Dispatch, May 27, 1900]
The following sketch of the Charlotte Cavalry has been offered for file in the Charlotte county court, together with the roll of the company:
[excerpt]
In March, 1865, I came back to our regiment, then transferred to Beale's Brigade, Army of Northern Virginia. It was near Five Forks. I was put in command of our regiment by Colonel Cochran (the only field officer present), who was too unwell to command. From Five Forks to Appomattox we were hard pressed, with little food and rest. All the way we were attacked on every side. Our ranks were thinned out by sickness, fatigue, hunger, wounds, death, broken down horses, until we had not over a hundred men and officers in our regiment on the morning of the 9th of April, 1865. Notwithstanding all this, and the general impression that our cause was lost, General W. H. F. Lee ordered our regiment on the 9th of April, 1865, to charge and take a battery then in our front. This it did, with other cavalry, capturing it and a number of prisoners. The regiment lost in killed and wounded in a few minutes a very large per cent. Its color-bearer was killed in the charge while planting his flag on the enemy's artillery. This is said to be the last charge ever made by, and this the last man killed in battle in the Army of Northern Virginia.
[excerpt]
To name all the officers and men who acted with bravery in various battles would be impossible, and, therefore, none have been named.
If your honors please, I do not think the time will ever come when the people of this, or any other, county will fail to honor the memory of this gallant band.
E. E. BOULDIN,
Formerly Captain Charlotte Cavalry, Company B,
14th Virginia, Confederate States Army.
[The following revised roll, has been recently furnished by Captain Bouldin.--ED.]
Roll of the Charlotte Cavalry. It served first in Major George Jackson's Squadron of Cavalry, C. S. A.; then it was made Company B in the 14th Virginia Cavalry, C. S. A., under General A. G. Jenkins, next under General John M. McCausland, and last under General Beale, in the Army of Northern Virginia:
Adams, Paul V., Second Sergeant.
Barksdale, Claiborne G.
Barksdale, Armistead, First Lieutenant.
Barksdale, E. Henry.
Bouldin, Powhatan.
Bouldin, Robert C.
Bouldin, Breckenridge C., Second Lieutenant and Adjutant 14th Virginia Cavalry. Killed at Brandy Station.
Bouldin, E. E., First Lieutenant, then Captain from April, 1862, until May, 1865. Wounded at Williamsport, July 14th, 1863. Bouldin, Thomas T., Jr. Bouldin, John E.
Beirne, Andrew, died in prison at Point Lookout. From Monroe county, West Virginia.
Baldwin, Samuel.
Bailey, Dr. L. P.
Booker, John, from Prince Edward county.
Bouldin, W. O.
Cardwell, Toby.
Chafin, Robert.
Carrington, Robert.
Caperton, Allen, wounded at Stevenson's depot. From Monroe county, West Virginia.
Chappell, Henry C., Sergeant, wounded at Gettysburg, on July 30, 1863.
Clarkson, R. A.
Chick, Henry, killed in the service, 1861, N. W. Va.
Cronin, Robert W.
Chappell, Wash B., wounded at Gettysburg in July, 1863.
Crews, James R., wounded in Rockbridge county in 1864.
Carrington, Edgar, killed in service.
Clarkson, W.
Dennis, Rice, from Halifax county, Va. Wounded in head at Winchester.
Dennis, Thomas H.
Daniel, Joel W., First Lieutenant until November, 1861.
Daniel, Thomas.
Daniel, John.
Dickerson, Henry P., Third Sergeant; wounded.
Dice, David. Wounded near Strasburg.
Dinwiddie, Joe.
Dunlap, Samuel A.
Dennis, Winslow R.
Dennis, John.
Dice, Henry, from Rockbridge county, Va. Wounded in 1864.
Elliott, Allen W.
Eggleston, George M.
Faris, George.
Fuqua, Dr. William M.
Friend, William G.
Friend, Robert M., wounded.
Friend, Isaac.
Flournoy, Nicholas E.
Ford, Luther R., Corporal.
Ford, Abner S., wounded at Lynchburg in 1863.
Ford, John R.
Ford, J. B.
Fossett, Pet
Flournoy, Dr. David, Captain from November, 1861, to April, 1862.
Gaines, William R., First Lieutenant. Wounded at Moorefield,1864.
Gaines, Robert L.
Gaines, R. H., Sergeant and Sergeant-Major 14th Virginia Cavalry.
Gaines, James.
Gaines, Samuel M., Lieutenant. Wounded, New Market, Virginia, February, 1862.
Gaines, Thomas.
Garden, James M.
Hopkins, Louis Christman, Rockbridge county, Va.
Hopkins, John James, Pendleton county, W. Va.
Hannah, George B., Lieutenant and aid to Generals Jenkins and McCausland.
Hannah, Andrew, killed at Williamsport, July 14, 1863.
Hannah, Samuel B.
Hamlett, John C., Sergeant and Third Lieutenant.
Hodge, William H.
Harvey, E. C.
Hutcherson, Robert F.
Henry, E. Winston.
Harvey, Mike.
Helms, ----.
Hundley, Charley, wounded in the head at Cedarville.
Johnson, John S., from Greenbrier county, W. Va.
Kent, Clarence Polk, from Wytheville, Va. Wounded in 1865.
Kent, Edwin Dallas, from Wytheville, Va. Wounded in 1865.
Lewis, Dr. Granville R.
Lewis, William B.
Lawson, George W.
Lacy, Dr. Horace P.
Morton, Clement R., Third Lieutenant.
Morton, Henry O., Corporal.
Moore, Thomas J., First Sergeant.
Morgan, L. Dennis, First Sergeant.
Marshall, Hunter H., Jr., killed at Amelia Courthouse, 1865.
Marshall, John.
Morris, Macon C., wounded at Appomattox Courthouse, April, 1865.
Marshall, John P., died from effects of cannon shot.
Marshall, Joel W., Lieutenant and Adjutant of 14th Virginia Cavalry.
Marshall, Ben W.
Marshall, Joel F.
Morton, David H.
McGhee, William.
McCargo, Samuel, killed at Gettysburg, July 3, 1863.
Moseley, J. B.
Morton, John J.
Melton, F.
Moses, Albert.
Morton, J. P.
Manns, Daniel.
Morton, John A.
Noel, Charles P., wounded in Valley of Virginia, 1864. From Pittsylvania county, Va.
Nichol, Charles, from Monroe county, W. Va.
Pettus, John.
Price, Samuel, wounded near Lexington, Va., in 1864.
Read, George W.
Read, Isaac.
Roberts, George H., Third Lieutenant until November, 1861.
Randol, Alex., from West Virginia.
Rice, Henry C.
Rice, David.
Roberts, John, died from wound received at Gettysburg, July 3, 1863.
Read, Thomas N.
Spencer, Charles.
Spencer, Thomas.
Spencer, James B.
Spragins, Norman B., wounded in Rockbridge county, Va., 1864.
Smith, John M., 4th Sergeant.
Sheperson, David, Third Lieutenant. Killed at Williamsport,
Sheperson, Joel.
Smith, John G., Captain from April, 1861, to November, 1861.
Spencer, William S.
Swicher, Daniel, Rockbridge county.
Saunders, Robert.
Scott, Thomas A.
Spencer, Henry.
Scott, J. H., died at Monterey, Va., in service, in 1861.
Thornton, W. D.
Thompkins, C. C., from Kanawha county, W. Va.
Thompson, James C.
Watkins, Charles W.
Watkins, Henry, killed at Bunker Hill, 1864.
Watkins, Frank B.
Williams, W. B.
Wood, Robert W.
Walker, William A.
Wood, Jas. E.
Walker, Alexander S., from Augusta county. Wounded near Brownsburg, Rockbridge county, Va.
Wilson, James H.
Watkins, Henry N.
Wills, William B.
Watkins, W. B.
Woods, William H., wounded at Williamsport, July, 1863. Watkins, Alfred.
West, Addison, from Halifax county, Va.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
continued

 

[M E Wolf]

Southern Historical Society Papers.
Vol. XXVIII. Richmond, Va., January-December. 1900.
Index.
Appomattox Courthouse, Wants of the army at, 39; Last charge at, 41,259; Last man killed at, 252.
April 9th, 1865, lines by Percy Greg, 376.
------ ------------ ----------- -------------- -----------
Southern Historical Society Papers.
Vol. XXVIII. Richmond, Va., January-December. 1900.
The Last Charge At Appomattox.
[excerpt]
The Fourteenth Virginia Cavalry.
It Fought Victoriously to the Bitter End--A Fight on April 9, 1865, Wherein Confederates Captured Cannon--Two Last Men Killed.
[From the Richmond, Va. Dispatch August 12, 1900.]
To the Editor of the Dispatch:
The last charge and captures at Appomattox Courthouse by any branch of the Army of Northern Virginia--at what time were they made, and who made them?

These pertinent questions will be considered, it is hoped, by Confederate veterans throughout the length and breadth of the Army of Northern Virginia, and will be determined fairly, by those especially who were present for duty on the last day of the war at Appomattox Courthouse.
This last charge occurred on the morning of the 9th of April, 1865, and my recollection is that we retired some time before noon of that day. I heard no further firing along our infantry or cavalry lines.
Our cavalry had been sorely pressed on all sides from Petersburg to Appomattox Courthouse. The demand on this branch of the service had been necessarily extremely exacting--not only to work in the advance of our columns, but in protecting the rear and flanks of our several lines of retreat, and to serve in the places of disabled and knocked out staff officers and couriers--and our ranks meantime were naturally reduced greatly in number by the death, wounds, and capture of men and horses, and in effectiveness by details, dismounts, fatigue, and hunger, that told most severely on our staggering horses, that had become a burden either to be abandoned or led dismounted; until at the last our entire brigade force was about equal to a depleted regiment at the latter end of the war.

THE FOURTEENTH VIRGINIA CAVALRY
Our regiment the 14th Virginia Cavalry, that was commanded at the time by myself as Captain of Company B, no field officer being present, had been transferred from General John M. McCausland's Brigade but a few weeks prior to the surrender, and assigned to General R. L. T. Beale's Brigade--W. H. F. Lee's Division.

On the night of the 8th, in obedience to orders delivered by Major Joseph Van Holt Nash. Adjutant-General of Cavalry--Stuart's Corps--we advanced our regiment to the head of our brigade and division and march through the village of Appomattox Courthouse, where there had been a skirmish the night before. When we had passed the village some little distance, in the direction of Lynchburg, we were halted and ordered to dismount--to hold our horses and not to turn them loose. There we remained, holding them by their bridles, and sitting and lying down on the ground, catching every wink of sleep that was possible, until the morning of the 9th.

Soon after day, General W. H. F. Lee rode to the head of our regiment, inquiring who was in command. When told and directed to myself, he promptly ordered, "Captain, mount your regiment!" This done, by his orders we moved forward and downward into the valley and thence through a skirt of woods, and soon came in view of a battery of the enemy that had been shelling during the morning. Then, upon orders, we formed, and charged across an open field into a piece of woods, capturing two handsome pieces of field artillery, with several elegantly attired officers, and a number of their men, that were all sent as rapidly as possible to the rear. Advancing quickly beyond the enemy's battery, we captured their reserve camp, which they had hurriedly deserted, leaving their breakfasts on the fires. Rapidly passing through this camp, we were attacked on our right by another column of the enemy. Turning our attention to that, and animated by our success, we charged and routed that force also, all of which involved a good deal of time, from start to finish. After which we were ordered to "stop firing and come out."

In these movements we were supported by the rest of our brigade, commanded by General Beale. Before we were enabled to retire, with our fraction of a brigade, I heard no further firing along our lines. Winding our way over the hills, we saw our infantry quietly closing in, and soon afterwards we were overtaken by General W. H. F. Lee, who informed us that General R. E. Lee had surrendered.

LAST MEN KILLED..
James H. Wilson, the color-bearer of our regiment, was mortally wounded while planting his colors on one of the guns that we captured. He was seen soon afterwards by his comrade, W. L. Moffett, lying on the ground, his beautiful bay mare standing by him, his colors folded and leaning against a tree. In this trying time of excitement and disappointment he bade Moffett good-by, and his last words were: "Moffett, it is hard to die just as the war is over." And so this heroic spirit passed away to join noble comrades who had preceded him.

He and James Walker, both of Company H, 14th Virginia Cavalry, were from Rockbridge county, Va., and are believed to be the two men killed last in battle in the Army of Northern Virginia. Can any stronger claim be preferred?

I have already furnished the Assistant Adjutant-General of our brigade with accounts of this last fight from John E. Bouldin, M. C. Morris, Samuel B. Hannah, Company B; W. B. F. Leech and J. H. Whitmore, Company H; George M. Francisco, Company I, 14th Virginia Cavalry, who participated in the charge and acted with distinguished gallantry, as did every man and officer who engaged in it. Dr. T. P. Hereford, then Assistant-surgeon, 14th Virginia Cavalry, remained on the ground and cared for the wounded in a small house a short distance from where General Lee surrendered. He says that in this charge there were from sixteen to twenty killed and wounded of our regiment, although not over 100 or 120 men and officers were engaged.

A FINE TRIBUTE.
In a recently published "History of the 9th Virginia Cavalry," a most interesting work, by its former Colonel, R. L. T. Beale, commanding our brigade at Appomattox, we find the following tribute to the men and officers of the 14th Virginia Cavalry, who participated in this last charge, together with a foot-note by the son of General Beale, who edited the notes of his father, page 147, as follows:

"Supporting and participating in part in the last charge which was made upon the artillery by any arms of the Army of Northern Virginia, they cheered their comrades of the 14th Virginia, led by gallant Captain E. E. Bouldin, of the Charlotte Troop, returning with two twelve-pound brass guns, wrested from General Sheridan while the terms of surrender were being signed. (Note.--In this last charge the brave young Color-Bearer, James Wilson, and Samuel Walker, of Company H, 14th Virginia Cavalry, both from Rockbridge county, laid down their lives, the last men to fall in battle in the Army of Northern Virginia.)"

[excerpt]
Let history show how gallantly our soldiers fought even when hope was gone and nothing left but their sense of duty to a just cause, and to the grandest army and commander that this world has ever known.
E. E. BOULDIN,
Formerly Captain Company B, 14th Virginia Cavalry.
P. S.--It is hoped that the press will notice the desire of Major Nash to get this information for publication.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
continued

 

[M E Wolf]

Southern Historical Society Papers.
Vol. XXXIV Richmond, Va., January-December. 1906
Met His Death In Last Fight.
ohn William Ashby is Man who Fell at Appomattox in Gordon's Last Assault.
This Question Now Settled Once for All--Also the Last Federal Soldier Killed.
From the Times-Dispatch July 29, 1906.
The Confederate soldier Ashby, whose gravestone at Appomattox bears the mark of "Second Virginia Cavalry," was not of that regiment. Inquiry has elicited the well verified statement that he belonged to Company I, of the Twelfth Virginia Cavalry, and that he was killed in action when Gordon advanced on the morning of April 9, 1865.

I enclose two communications on the subject, the one from Bushrod Rust, formerly of Company I, Twelfth Virginia Cavalry, the other from Captain (now General) R. D. Funkhouser, of the Confederate Veterans.

Here let me say that I am trying to get the names of the Confederates who fell in the last days of the Army of Northern Virginia, from April 2d to April 9th. I would thank any comrade to send me the statement of any officer or soldier killed within that period, and I am especially desirous, as chairman of the History Committee of the Grand Camp, Confederate Veterans of Virginia, to get a statement of all Virginia soldiers who were killed and wounded within those dates--April 2d to April 9th, 1865. I have had collected a number of names which might have been forgotten or lost sight of, and hereby ask any one who has knowledge or information to send it to me at Lynchburg, Va.
Very respectfully,
JOHN W. DANIEL.

BUSHROD RUST WRITES.
Dear Major Daniel,--In the Confederate column, Sunday, July 1, 1906, I noticed your inquiry, "To what company and regiment Ashby, who was killed at Appomattox, belonged?" Buckner Ashby, a wealthy farmer, resided near Stone Bridge. Clark county, Va., before and at the commencement of the "war between the States," and had three grown sons, James Lewis, John William, and Buckner G. Ashby.

At the commencement of hostilities James Lewis Ashby enlisted in Company D, Clarke Cavalry, Sixth Virginia Regiment, and was killed in action at the battle of Trevillian's, June 12, 1864, Hampton commanding Confederates and Sheridan the Federals.

He was a gallant soldier, a most estimable gentleman, and a true patriot. John William Ashby enlisted in Company I, Twelfth Virginia Cavalry, in April, 1862, and served his country well up to the time of his death, at Appomattox, April 9, 1865.

He had participated in many hard fought engagements before the final campaign from Five Forks to Appomattox.

Directly after the Beverley raid in January, 1865, our regiment the Twelfth, was furloughed home for some weeks on account of the scarcity of forage. At the proper time all were ready to meet the foe, and our brigade was placed under the command of General James Dearing, a worthy successor of the peerless Turner Ashby and the gallant Rosser.

John Williams Ashby took his place in the ranks and did his whole duty at Five Forks, and in every other action in which his command was engaged, including the hard fight at High Bridge.

At Appomattox, Sunday, April 9, 1865, General Gordon was ordered to force a passage through the Federal lines, and in the midst of the fierce combat which ensued Ashby was mortally wounded by a cannon shot, and left in charge of John Buckner Ashby, a member of the same company. After undergoing the most intense agony for about two hours, Ashby died, and his remains were interred.

He was a noble man, a dauntless soldier, a faithful comrade, an enthusiast in his love for his beloved southland, and one of the dearest friends the writer ever had. Requiescat in pace.
BUSHROD RUST,
Company I, Twelfth Virginia Calvary.
-----------------------------------------
GENERAL FUNHOUSER'S LETTER.
MAURERTOWN, VA., July 6, 1906.
Major William F. Graves:
Dear Sir,--I noticed the article in the Richmond Times-Dispatch of July 4, 1906, in which there is mentioned the name of Ashby, a cavalryman who was killed near Appomattox Courthouse and buried there, etc., and I write to inform you that he belonged to the Twelfth Virginia Cavalry, and is the reason you cannot find his name in the roster of the Second Virginia Cavalry. William Ashby was a native of Warren county, Va., which was my native county also, and he joined my infantry, Company D, of the Forty-ninth Infantry (Virginia), "Extra Billy" Smith's Regiment, but went to the cavalry before we left our county seat, Front Royal, Va., in June, 1861, and I always heard that he was killed in the last cavalry charge at Appomattox Courthouse, April 9, 1865.

I was Captain J. B. Updike's first lieutenant, and succeeded him in command of the company after 12th May, 1864, at Spotsylvania, when the Captain was wounded, and was never fit for duty afterwards. You may know him. He lives at Clover Dale, Botetourt county, Va., and was a brave and kind officer, and a jolly good fellow. We were reared in same county, six miles apart, and were militia officers before the war, and well acquainted, and went to work and made up a company, which became distinguished in the First Manassas battle by being in the charge with the Stonewall Brigade that took Ricketts' Battery on the Henry House hill, which ended the fight in the Confederates' favor. And then, too, we were thrown into the balance at Spotsylvania Courthouse, May 12, 1864, after Johnson's division was captured, when all seemed to be lost, and it was our duty to try to retake the works. Then it was General R. E. Lee rode up and offered to lead us, the Forty-ninth Virginia Regiment, Pegram's Brigade, Gordon's Division, and William A. Compton, of Company D, Forty-ninth, led his (General Lee's) horse to the rear; and history knows the rest. And it is a pleasure to me always to assist in having all of the brave Confederates, and more especially the names of those who lost their lives in the struggle of '61-'65 for constitutional liberty and State's rights, placed upon the Confederate roster, so that the histories may duly record their deeds on the brightest pages of chivalry and heroism in the world's history. This is my reason for giving the foregoing information as regards William Ashby.

Yours truly,
R. D. FUNKHOUSER.
-----
[The following from the Baltimore American of January 6, 1907, gives not only an account of the last man killed on the Federal side in 1865, but includes also some other facts of interest.--ED.]
Last Man Killed in Civil War.
(Anderson Cor. Indianapolis News.)
Capt. B. B. Campbell and Daniel F. Mustard, of this city, members of the Thirty-fourth Indiana Infantry in the Civil War, have obtained the last photograph of the last man killed in the Civil War --John Jefferson Williams, of Jay county.

It is on record that the last battle of the Civil War was the one in which Jeff. Williams was killed," said Mr. Mustard. "It was fought on May 13, 1865, almost a month after the surrender of Lee to Grant. The prolonged campaign of our regiment was accounted for because of delay in getting word to us to lay down arms. We got into that last battle when we went to the relief of some colored troops who were foraging for beef cattle, and were charged on by Confederates. Jeff Williams was the only man killed.

"The boys carried his body to near Brownsville, Tex., where it was buried. About 10 days afterward our regiment was marching into Brownsville, Tex., to take that town when we met Confederates who did not oppose us and explained that the war was over. We then occupied Fort Brown and other camps near Brownsville until ordered home for our discharge."

[end of search in the Confederate History files]
--------------------------------------
M. E. Wolf

 

[M E Wolf]

Internet:

http://thomaslegioncherokee.tripod.com/lastshot.html

According to this site; on May 6th, 1865, Lieutenant Robert T. Conley with a small company from Thomas' Legion clashed with Union Lt. Colonel William C. Bartlett's 2nd North Carolina Mounted Infantry Regiment in White Sulpher Springs.

Identifying a Union Soldier - James Arwood was the last soldier to die, west of the Mississippi.
-----------------------------------------------------------

http://www.pbs.org/civilwar/war/facts.html

States: On May 13, 1865, a month after Lee's surrender at Appomattox, Private John J. Williams of the 34th Indiana became the last man killed in the Civil War, in a battle at Palmito Ranch, Texas. The final skirmish was a Confederate victory.
--------------------------------------
http://freepages.history.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~bellware/

States:
On May 9, 1865, President Andrew Johnson proclaimed the "the rebellion on land is ended." He obviously considered to have ended prior to the skirmishes at Palmito Ranch. Finally, in 1886, W.T. Sherman remarked to the editor of the North American Review magazine that he believed C.A.L. Lamar to be the last Confederate killed in the war and that General Wilson would be able to confirm that fact. It follows that Sherman considered the battle at Columbus to be the last one of the war.
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Going back to Confederate Military History:
Confederate Military History, Vol. 6
CHAPTER VI.
[excerpt]
The Seventh battalion Georgia infantry, which was consolidated with the Sixty-first regiment, had at first the following officers: Lieut.-Col. Charles A. L. Lamar, Maj. John H. Lamar, who became lieutenant-colonel. This battalion served for a time on the Georgia coast. As it was merged in the Sixty-first Georgia, its campaigns are included in the sketch of that regiment.
[excerpt]
Confederate Military History, Vol. 6
CHAPTER XVIII.
[excerpt]
At Columbus on the same day, April 16th, a week after General Lee's surrender, Gen. Howell Cobb made a gallant attempt to defend the bridges over the Chattahoochee, fighting on the Alabama side, but was overwhelmed by the Federal forces, who took possession of the city, capturing 1,200 prisoners and 52 field guns. Col. C. A. L. Lamar, of General Cobb's staff, was among the killed. The Federal loss was 24 killed and wounded. The ram Jackson, which had been built for the defense of the Chattahoochee, now nearly ready for service, with an armament of six 7-inch guns, was destroyed, as were also the navy yard, foundries, arsenal, armory, sword and pistol factory, shops, paper mills: cotton factories, 15 locomotives, 200 cars, and a large amount of cotton.
[end of excerpt]
------------------------
M. E. Wolf

 

[larry_cockerham]

I suspect it's not so important who died last, but rather our charge to honor and somehow remember the fact that those who died did so in the service of their country at far too great a cost. An unecessary war at best.

 

[TerryB]

I would hope that some monument marks the graves of those "last men killed," if for no other reason than the pure tragedy of being the last.

 

[PINCKNEYUSMCRET]

Post #259 What a loss for Hardee in a battle in a war he must have known they were loseing. But then how do you order other mothers sons into battle if you are not willing to order your own. My admiration for Hardee just went up some. Imagine him having to tell his wife.

Pinckney

 

[larry_cockerham]

Post #259 What a loss for Hardee in a battle in a war he must have known they were loseing. But then how do you order other mothers sons into battle if you are not willing to order your own. My admiration for Hardee just went up some. Imagine him having to tell his wife.

Pinckney

Yes, this war was indeed horrible at all levels. Here in Tennessee I've noticed that many folks assume the AOT was dusted after they crossed the state line into Alabama on December 27, 1864. Not by a long shot, as evidenced by the battles at Selma, Averasboro and Bentonville. These were proud men who suffered until the last volley was fired. They only quit when they were out of beans, bullets and unfortunately, blood.