Bill Arp from the Uncivil War to Date,
1861-1903:
Electronic Edition.
Arp, Bill, 1826-1903
Funding from the Library of
Congress/Ameritech National Digital Library
Competition supported the electronic publication of this
title.
Text scanned (OCR) by
Victoria Strickland-Cordial
Images scanned by
Jill Kuhn
Text encoded by
Jill Kuhn and Natalia Smith
First edition, 1998
ca. 800K
Academic Affairs Library, UNC-CH
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill,
1998.
The electronic edition
is a part of the UNC-CH
digitization project, Documenting the American
South,
Beginnings to 1920. Any hyphens occurring
in line breaks have been
removed, and the trailing part of a word has been joined to
the preceding line.
All quotation marks
and ampersand have been transcribed as
entity references.
All double right and
left quotation marks are encoded as " and "
respectively.
All single right and
left quotation marks are encoded as '
and ' respectively.
Indentation in lines
has not been preserved.
Running titles have
not been preserved.
Spell-check and
verification made against printed text using
Author/Editor (SoftQuad) and Microsoft Word spell check programs.
Library of Congress Subject
Headings,
21st edition, 1998
LC Subject Headings:
Arp, Bill, 1826-1903.
Authors, American -- 19th century -- Biography.
Humorists, American -- Biography.
Southern States -- Social life and customs.
United States -- History -- Civil War, 1861-1865 -- Personal
narratives, Confederate.
1999-01-14,
Celine Noel and Wanda Gunther
revised TEIHeader and created catalog
record for the electronic edition.
1998-12-18, Natalia Smith,
project manager,
finished TEI-conformant encoding and final proofing.
1998-12-17, Jill Kuhn
finished TEI/SGML encoding
1998-09-22,
Victoria Strickland-Cordial
finished scanning (OCR) and proofing.
The events of my father's life may be chronicled in a
few lines, but it would take many pages to tell of the mental
and spiritual gifts that made that life notable, and of its
influence over a wide circle of known and unknown friends.
Still more potent was the impress of his character upon
those nearest to him, whose privilege it was to see him day
by day and partake of the wit, wisdom, kindliness and humor
that made him the most fascinating of companions to his
children. He has himself told in this book the main incidents
of his career; how his father, Asahel Reid Smith, a sturdy
young son of Massachusetts, came South to teach school
and married his fourteen-year-old pupil, pretty little Caroline
Maguire, whose story as her son has written it, is most
interesting and romantic. They were married near Savannah
but later moved to Lawrenceville, Gwinnett County, where
my father was born on June 15th, 1826, the eldest of ten
children. My grandfather became a thriving merchant of
Lawrenceville, postmaster as well, and my father has told
us many entertaining stories of the days when he used to
"ride the mail" and sell ribbons and things to the girls.
After some time spent in a manual labor school, he went
to college at Athens, where he was the classmate and
friend of many of the notable men of later
days. He held his friends in the greatest esteem and
affection, and it was one of the sorrows of his long life to
see them pass away one by one.
After his graduation at Franklin College, now the
University of Georgia, my father studied law in the office
of Judge Nathan Lewis Hutchins of Lawrenceville, and
was admitted to the bar. Here also he had the privilege of
association with the noted politicians, lawyers and judges
that made of Georgia history of that day a series of brilliant
chapters.
In 1849 he married Mary Octavia Hutchins, the daughter
of his preceptor, then only seventeen years old. The
following poem was written in her album while they were
sweethearts:
TO OCTAVIA.
I've
not the Bard's rich gift or Poet's
soul To
pen my feelings in a tuneful
rhyme;
I
have no power that can at will
control
The
thoughts and breathings of my humble mind.
A
heart to feel, and knowledge to
discern The
ties of friendship, and of love, are
mine;
May these, Octavia gain the kind
return Of
real friendship from that heart of thine.
An
album's pages tell of many a
friend Pleasant
to sight and to the memory
dear; Each
loves to wish thee well, and to
blend Thy
destiny with joys and hope sincere.
Thine
be the lot that gives to others
joy, For
thus you'll reap a harvest of your
own; May
no misfortune, pain, or cares
annoy And
garlands in thy path of life be strewn.
When
incense on the sacred altar
burned Its
odours seemed in prayerful clouds to
rise;
so may our wishes all to Heaven
turned Procure
rich blessings for thee from the skies.
Fifty-four years they
lived together, and all the days of
those years were a continuation of that youthful
devotion.
Shortly after their marriage my father and mother
moved to Rome, where he began the practice of law,
associated with Judge J. W. H. Underwood. When the
war began he became a staff officer with General Francis
Bartow, later was assigned by President Davis to special
judiciary duty in Macon. It was on his return to Rome in
1865 that he began to write regularly over the nom de
plume of Bill Arp, but his first letter appeared in 1861, and
is as follows:
"Rome, Ga., April, 1861.--Mr. Linkhorn: Sur: These are to
inform you that we are all well, and hope these lines may
find you in statue ko. We received your proklamation, and
as you have put us on very short notis, a few of us have
conkluded to write you, and ax for a little more time. The
fact is, we are most obleeged to have a few more days, for
the way things are happening, it is utterly onpossible for us
to disperse in twenty days. Old Virginny, Tennessee, and
North Callina, are continually aggravatin us into tumults and
carousements, and a body can't disperse until you put a
stop to sich onruly condukt on their part. I tried my
darndest yisterday to disperse and retire, but it was no go;
and besides, your marshal here ain't doing a darned thing -
he don't read the riot act, nor remonstrate, nor nothing, and
ought to be turned out. If you conklude to do so, I am
orthorized to rekummend to you Colonel
Gibbons or Mr. McLung, who would attend to the bizness
as well as most anybody.
"The fact is, the boys round here want watchin, or they'll
take sumthin. A few days ago I heard they surrounded two
of our best citizens, because
they was named Fort and Sumter. Most of em are so hot
that they fairly siz when you pour water on em, and that's
the way they amke up their military companies here now--
when a man applies to jine the volunteers, they sprinkle him,
and if he sizzes they take him, and if he don't they don't.
"Mr. Linkhorn, sur, privately speakin, I'm afeerd I'll git in
a tite place here among these bloods, and .have to slope out
of it, and I would like to have your Skotch cap and kloak that
you traveled in to Washington. I suppose you wouldn't be
likely to use the same disgize agin, when you left, and
therefore I would propose to swap. I am five feet five, and
could git my plow breeches and coat to you in eight or ten
days if you can wait that long. I want you to write me
immegitly about things generally, and let us know
wherebouts you intend to do your fitin. Your proklamation
says something about takin possession of all the private
property at 'All Harzards.' We can't find no such place on
the map. I thot it must be about Charleston, or Savannah, or
Harper's Ferry, but they say it aint anywhere down south.
One man said it was a little Faktory on an iland in Lake
Champlain, where they make sandbags. My opinion is that
sandbag bisness won't pay, and it is a great waste of money.
Our boys here carry there sand in there gizzards, where it
keeps better, and is always handy. I'm afeered your
government is givin you and your kangaroo a great deal of
onnecessary trubbul, and my humble advice is, if things
don't work better soon, you'd better grease it, or trade the
darned old thing off. If you don't trade or do sumthin else
with it soon, it will spile or die on your hands, sertain.
members of the kangaroo. What's Hannibal doin?
I don't hear anything from him nowadays. Yours,
with care,
BILL ARP."
My father has already told how he came to use the name
which he has made famous throughout the South. The
original Bill Arp, an illiterate countryman, moved to Texas,
and for some years after newspaper paragraphs confusing
his identity and my father's were both annoying and
amusing. We have long since lost trace of him.
In October, 1877, we moved to Bartow County, my
father having purchased a farm which he subsequently sold
to Sam Jones, the evangelist. The new home was called
Fontainebleau, from Mr. Francis Fontaine, the previous
owner. As the boys grew up and left the farm for more
congenial occupations and my father's duties as writer and
lecturer took him much from home, it was decided to leave
the country and settle in Cartersville, where we have since
lived at "The Shadows," and where my father died on
August the 24th, aged seventy-seven years.
The family tree is one which has now many
branches. There were ten children in the original
family; there were thirteen of us, ten are now living.
The children and grandchildren may be thus de-
scribed:
1. Hines M. Smith, civil engineer, Rome, Ga., married
Miss Sparks, of Athens, Ga., five children.
2. Royal Randolph Smith, civil engineer, Cartersville, Ga.,
married to Miss Ayer of Rome, Ga., three children.
3. Harriet Hutchins Smith, married to George H. Aubrey,
Cartersville, Ga., five children. Mr. Aubrey, is a grandson
of Hon. John Forsyth, former Governor of Georgia.
4. Frank Clifton Smith, civil engineer, San Antonio,
Texas, married to daughter of Colonel Stanwood of Ohio,
two children.
5. Victor Smith, with New York Press, unmarried.
6. Marian Smith, living at home.
7. Stella Smith, widow of the late R. H. Brumby; living at
home; one child.
8. Ralph Smith, physician, Marietta, Ga., married to Miss
Sara Keely, of Philadelphia; one child.
9. Carl Smith, in Mexico; unmarried.
10. Jessie Smith, married to William Young, of
Cartersville, Ga.; three children.
Besides these there were two nieces of my mother,
brought up as members of the family.
11. Mrs. Julia Iverson Patton, of Atlanta, Ga.
12. Mrs. Minnie Iverson Randolph, Atlanta, Ga.
My father's weekly letters to the Atlanta "Constitution"
and the Louisville "Home and Farm" were widely read and
copied and brought him in close touch with people North,
South, East and West. In addition to this work he published
the following books:
"Bill Arp's Letters," 1870.
"Bill Arp's Scrap Book," Humor and Philosophy, 1884.
"The Farm and Fireside," 1891.
"History of Georgia," 1895.
"From the Uncivil War to Date," 1903.
Always an early riser, it was his habit to walk up and
down the halls of the home playing the flute to waken us in
the morning, or playing the piano in his own unique fashion,
all on the black keys, but peculiarly sweet and effective as
he did it. One of my earliest recollections is of being
aroused by the strains of the flute, when climbing out of
bed, nightgowned,
barefooted, I toddled to his side and with the other
children marched up and down the hall clinging to his
dressing gown while he played "Way Down in Shinbone
Alley," "Run, Nigger, Run," and other old-time tunes, until
nurse came to get us ready for breakfast.
His loving care of us as little ones continued in after
years, when he unselfishly shared our larger griefs, or
rejoiced with us in our pleasures and pastimes. How often
as I have told him of some sorrow or disappointment would
he gently stroke my hand and say earnestly: "Even this shall
pass away." His example led us to love the church; by his
side we managed to live through many a long and tiresome
discourse, comforted by smuggled candies or peppermint
drops.
The following story illustrates his interest even in
children not his own:
During one of his lecture trips he was travelling in the
car with a tired mother and several restless little children.
One little one begged, "Mama, may I suck my thumb?" The
mother refused, evidently feeling that discipline must be
maintained. My father's child-loving heart could stand it no
longer, so he said in his courteous way, "Madam, I think,
under the circumstances, I would let her suck her thumb."
We never realized what a rare privilege was ours in
having such a companion until we moved to the country.
Here a certain degree of privation followed closely on our
footsteps. We had to practice hitherto unknown economies
and to shoulder household cares that were new to us, but
he was the lever that made things easy. His very
cheerfulness was a
godsend, and his philosophy lightened many difficult and
uncongenial tasks.
After work hours or on Sundays he would call us all for
a walk, "go to Nature's Church," as he said. Such lessons in
natural history and botany! We were taught to respect the
very worm that crawls; to know when and where to find
the first wild flowers and fruits--taught in his broad-minded,
reverent way the wonders of mother earth. He never
ceased to study these great mysteries himself, and it was
this nearness to nature that made him the noble, clean-hearted
man he was to the day he died.
On long winter evenings he would gather us around a
huge wood fire and tell us wonderful tales of his boyhood,
of his mother's life, of the war, and stories of the great and
good people he had known in both real life and books.
He did not care for the ephemeral literature of the time,
but was rarely versed in standard works of both poetry and
prose. The Bible and Josephus were his daily companions,
and his library contained reference books of every kind,
through which he constantly added to his store of
knowledge, giving it out in conversation and letters with
generous heart to those less wise or learned.
I have heard him chuckle over a good joke in his own
whole-hearted fashion, or have seen the tears in his eyes
as he read some touching story of human interest. He
encouraged every member of the family to love music and
good books; he would allow nothing but good-natured
gossip of our friends and neighbors. His last years at the
"Shadows" were devoted to his garden; flowers and fruits
grew for him to perfection. Roses and old-fashioned pinks
were his favorites. Every morning the rarest blossom
was culled and laid, a morning greeting, at my
mother's breakfast plate. Later in the day we were all
expected to gather in the garden and enjoy its delights with
him. He shared his flowers with all the friends who came to
see us, presenting a short-stemmed, old-fashioned bouquet
to each one, with a courtly, old-time grace peculiar to
himself.
The Confederacy was a passion with my father. He
loved to honor the old South and her veterans. It was
something worth living for to hear him tell
an appreciative audience of the old days, and defend the
rights of his people. He was peculiarly gifted as a
story-teller, he never forgot an incident or a name.
During his last illness the question arose concerning
the name of a New York physician who figured in an
incident some twenty years ago. No one could recall it. The
question was put to my father, who was tossing and
muttering, semi-delirious. A moment of quiet, a look of
intelligence, and the name was uttered clearly--then an
immediate lapse into unconsciousness. As a college girl I
always declared I "never needed a dictionary or an
encyclopedia - papa knew everything."
The day came when he grew too feeble to walk in his
garden, or to read or write as he had always done. Then he
would totter out to his chair on the porch and with his
"far-glasses" on wait patiently for the coming of his little
grandchildren. His mind, grown childlike, craved their
companionship. The love of children for him was only
equalled by his love for them. Half the little ones in the
town called him "grandpa." Hardly a day passed that
he did not get letters from boys and girls of all ages, and
never did he fail to answer them.
Letters came from all over the United States, with
questions and requests of all kinds. Hundreds wrote just
to tell of the sunshine he had brought into their lives. Since
he has gone from us the letters continue to come from
known and unknown friends, written as if with one pen:
"The loss is not yours alone; our loss is great; the whole
South mourns with you." All this sympathy and appreciation
is a priceless treasure to us who mourn our truest friend
and dearest companion.
We laid him away under a pall of beautiful flowers sent
by those who loved him, in the little cemetery at
Cartersville, for he said he wanted to be near us still in both
body and spirit. In the same grave with him is the body of
his youngest grandchild, little Sara, eight months old, the
daughter of my brother Ralph, who died within a week after
he passed away.
If one might write my father's epitaph in the language of
a great poet, it would be this:
"He was a man take him for all in all,
I shall not look upon his like again."
My dear young friends: Let me tell you a pretty story. Just
a hundred years ago there was a young man hanged in
Dublin, Ireland, for committing treason against the English
government. His name was Robert Emmet, and his crime
was that of organizing a rebellion which was intended to set
Ireland free from the dominion of England and to place his
native land among the nations as free and independent. The
rebellion failed, and its leaders had to escape for their lives.
Emmet was one of the most eloquent and gifted men in all
the land. He graduated with high honors at Trinity College,
and at this time was engaged to be married to Miss Curran,
the beautiful daughter of the great Irish lawyer, John Philpot
Curran. After the rebellion was crushed he fled to France,
where he remained for two years, and then, in disguise,
went back to Ireland to marry the lady he loved and bring
her to the United States. But English detectives were on his
track and arrested him. He was tried, convicted and hanged,
and his affianced died of a broken heart. His speech made
in his own defense was the most eloquent, pathetic and
patriotic ever delivered in any court room. I used
to speak part of it when I was a schoolboy, and still recall
the last sentence, "When I am dead let no man write my
epitaph--until Ireland is free let not my epitaph be written."
pointer to my story. Among Emmet's college companions
and his comrades in the rebellion were two brothers whose
names were James and Patrick Maguire. They were the
younger sons of Sir Francis Maguire, a member of
Parliament and a very wealthy gentleman. He did not favor
the rebellion, but could not control his younger boys. They,
too, had to flee the country, and did so in a vessel that their
father bought and equipped for that purpose. They came to
Charleston, S. C., in 1803 and began business as linen
merchants. In the course of a year or two Patrick sold his
interest and changed his abode, but James continued the
business and married Emily Barret. Two children were born
to them, James and Caroline. When these children were
nine and seven years of age the yellow fever visited
Charleston, and in a brief time swept half of the population
into their graves. Maguire and his wife died almost
simultaneously, and were buried by night in the same
grave--for all night long the hearses and dead carts were
rumbling over the cobble stones, their tires bound in bagging
to smother the noise.
Now, my children, this brings me to the saddest and
sweetest part of my story. The pestilence was awful. All
who could fly from it did so, but there were thousands who
had nowhere to go or who could not leave the dead and
dying in their own households. A good man came and took
James, the boy, to his home, and a good woman took
Caroline. Next morning an order was issued that all children
who had no homes should be put on board the vessels that
were anchored near the city and sent to some other port. In
the confusion there was no effort made to keep brothers
and sisters together, and James was placed on board a
brig bound for Boston, and Caroline on a
schooner under sail for Savannah, but neither knew what
had become of the other. Just imagine their grief and
desolation. Alone in the wide world - no father or mother, no
kindred, no loving friends! After a stormy voyage the brig
reached Boston, where the boy was placed in an orphan
asylum. Caroline was landed in Savannah and found a
home in an asylum there. The matrons in charge of each
were good and kind, but the children's eyes were red and
their pillows wet with weeping. They were just old enough
to realize what they had lost.
Now, let us skip over two or three years. When James
was ten years old, a wealthy gentleman, a manufacturer of
boots and shoes who lived at Randolph, fifteen miles east of
Boston, came to the asylum to choose a boy, to wait on him
in his counting room. James was a bright and handsome lad,
and the gentleman, whose name was Burwell, chose him
and took him home with him. He proved to be the very boy
he wanted, and grew into favor. Part of the time he was
sent to school and learned rapidly, and in a few years was
taken into partnership, and the old gentleman gave him his
only daughter for a wife. Young Maguire was a good man,
loved and respected by all who knew him, but at times he
was sad, very sad, because of his lost sister. Twice he had
visited Charleston and made diligent search, but found no
clue. He found the very house he was born in and where his
parents died, but new people lived in it and the neighbors
were all new. An old negro woman remembered the
Maguires, and said she washed for them, but that was all.
She thought that the fever "got 'em all," she said.
people. So much so that when he was only twenty-six years
old he was elected State Senator, and became well
acquainted with Daniel Webster and Rufus Choate and
Judge Story.
Now you know, my young friends, in a small village like
Randolph everybody knew all about everybody, and could
tell where they came from. And so it was very generally
known that Maguire had lost his sister and had not a
relative in the wide world that he knew of, and how he had
sought for her, but in vain, and why it was that at times he
seemed so sad and distressed. Well, he lived in a beautiful
home in Randolph, and right across the street lived his most
intimate friend and neighbor, whose name was Wales.
Wales knew all his sorrows and could weep over them too.
But what of little Caroline, "The Flower of Dumblane,"
as they used to call her in her childhood--for she was
as lovely in disposition as she was beautiful. She had to tell
her sad story in tears to the good matron--and the good
woman cried too, and the orphans cried, for it was a sadder
case, if possible, than any of theirs.
But Time is a good doctor, and after a few days Caroline
became interested in her new home, and her broken heart
began to heal and went out in love to the matrons and the
many children who were her companions. She had been
there about two years when one day a fine lady came there
in a fine carriage, and after introducing herself to the
matron, she said she came to see if she could get a nice,
pretty orphan girl to go and live with her and keep her
company. That she lived on a rice plantation in Liberty
county--that her children had grown up and married and
moved too far away, and that her
name was Goulding, the mother of Dr. Goulding, the
Presbyterian preacher, and the grandmother of Frank, who
wrote "The Young Marooners." It was not an unusual thing
for good people to come and choose a child and take her
away and adopt her, but it was always a sad time and made
solemn and serious impression upon them. They knew that
one of their number had to go, and that they would see her
no more, perhaps forever--which one--which one, they
wondered, and each one said, "maybe it will be me," and the
thought alarmed them. They were happy where they were,
and a change to some one they did not know, filled their
hearts with fear. Well, the fine lady was shown to the large
reception room where the children had to gather on such
occasions. The children had of course to put on their best
garments, which were all uniform, and wash their faces and
brush their hair, and they marched in and were seated on
the benches that were next to the walls of the large room.
Then the grand lady walked around slowly and talked to
every one she fancied, and said kind, pleasant words and
asked them many questions. It was soon noticed that every
time she went around she stopped longer with little Caroline
than any other, and after the third round she turned to the
matron and said, "I will take this one." The little girl
trembled like an aspen leaf. Her heart beat rapidly, and
tears filled her eyes. With the other girls the agony was
over, but they grieved that Caroline was chosen, for they
loved her very dearly. The matron, too, was sad as she
kissed her a last goodbye--her heart was too full to speak it.
It was a tearful scene as the orphans, every one of whom
had her own sad experience, marched to Caroline and
kissed her farewell.
But she was soon in the fine carriage with the fine lady,
and a fine team of horses were gaily trotting down the
avenue. They reached the lady's home that evening, and
Caroline found everything so strange and singular that for a
time she forgot the change in her condition. There was a
grand old mansion in a grove of evergreens. All along the
way she had seen the beautiful magnolias and caught the
fragrance of the yellow jessamine, and now she inhaled the
sweet odor of the cape jessamine that came from a long
row that bordered the carriage way and adorned the walks
near the house. Not far away were the barns and rice mills,
and another for the sugar cane, and still further off were
long lines of negro houses - all just alike and whitewashed,
and each with a garden attached.
But alas! not a white child was to be seen nor a white
person, save Mrs. Goulding and herself. Scores of little
negroes were playing around the cabin yards, and they came
near and looked curiously at the little white girl that "Ole
Mistis" had brought home with her. After supper Caroline
soon grew tired from her journey and was put to bed, where
she again wet the pillows with her tears, but soon dropped to
sleep. The morning was bright and the country air was
balmy, and she brightened with the day. About a mile away
there lived a family of Allstons, who had recently moved
from South Carolina. They were good people, and closely
related to the family of William Allston, the great painter,
who married Theodosia, the daughter of Aaron Burr, and
who was drowned at sea or murdered by pirates. Her sad
fate is still unknown. With the children of this Allston family
Caroline soon got intimate, and Mr. Allston, when on a
visit to Charleston,
made diligent effort to find some clew to her lost
brother, but found none.
Mrs. Goulding was very desirous of sending Caroline to
school, but there was none near enough. And so Mr.
Allston went to Savannah to look around and if possible to
secure a teacher.
Now, children, listen, for we have come to another
branch of this story. About the year 1817 a young man whose
name was Reid, a native of Vermont, was teaching school
in a little town in Massachusetts. He was smart and
energetic and saved his money. One of his young friends
told him one day that they could charter a sloop and make a
big lot of money shipping brick to Savannah. Brick were
cheap in Newberryport and brought a high price in
Savannah. They put their money together, bought the
cargo, hired four sailors, and set sail. The voyage was
prosperous until they neared the port. Then a terrific storm
came up, and for fear of losing their vessels and their lives,
they had to throw a good part of the cargo into the sea.
They had barely enough brick left to sell for sufficient
money to pay off the sailors and send the sloop back to its
owners. Young Reid's companion got discouraged and
homesick and went back with it; but Reid was too game a
young man to go back without a dollar in his pocket. So he
hired to a grocery merchant as a porter, and did his work so
well and faithfully that he soon grew into favor and was
promoted to the counting room. It was about this time that
Mr. Allston visited the city in search of a teacher, and it so
happened that this merchant was his friend and factor. He
gave Reid a very high character, and told him he was a
good scholar and had taught school up North. He hated to
give him up, but Reid desired
to go, and he was soon on his way to Liberty county. A
good school was made up for him at once, and Caroline
became one of his scholars. In that day the teachers
boarded around among their patrons, staying a week or
more with each family; and so Reid soon learned all about
Caroline's sad history, and his tender heart went out in
sympathy for her. She was then thirteen years old, well
grown for her age, and was lovely in form and feature. She
was modest in behavior and at times seemed sad almost to
tears. Reid took great interest in her, and she soon became
one of his brightest scholars.
But change is written on everything in this world, and so it
happened that when Caroline became fourteen years old
and had a right under the law to choose her own guardian,
she went into court and choose Mr. Allston and became an
inmate of his family. She was so lonely with the old lady,
and besides the old lady had married again--a Mr.
Williamson,--and they did not live harmoniously together, and
each contended for the guardianship of Caroline. It was
young Reid, however, who took Caroline into his confidence
and advised her to choose Mr. Allston. About this time the
State of Georgia bought from the Creek Indians all their
land in the up country and had them surveyed and opened
up to settlers. Then there began a great exodus of low
country people up to the new purchase, where mountains
and valleys and fast flowing streams abounded. Mr. Allston
took the up-country fever and prepared his household to
move. He did move, and of course Caroline had to go with
the family. She bade her teacher goodbye and wept upon
his bosom. He never knew till then how much he loved her.
At the end of his school term he too took the up-country
fever, but finding a good opening at Mt. Vernon, in
Montgomery county, he stopped there and taught for a year
and laid up a little more money. Mr. Allston had settled on
a creek, a few miles east from Decatur, and was engaged
in building log houses and clearing land. He had built a large
double log cabin, with shed rooms attached, and had moved
into it. He concluded to christen the new home with a
frolic, so one bright moonshiny night he had all of the
neighbors invited to come over and have music and perhaps
a country dance. But Caroline did not seem to enjoy it.
Most of the time she sat in the piazza and seemed anxious
and melancholy. A spirit whispered to her that Reid was
coming, she always declared, and she could not get rid of
the expectation. And sure enough, about nine o'clock, she
saw a man riding slowly up the road-way, and when quite
near he dismounted and hitched his horse. She did not wait
for him, but with a cry of joy, rushed out to meet him and
threw herself gladly into his arms. Once again she had
found her best friend.
Now, children, we must skip some, for this story is
getting too long. A young man by the name of
Featherstone had married Mr. Allston's eldest daughter.
He was a merchant, and was living in Lawrenceville, about
twenty miles away. Reid was expecting to make up a
school in that little town, but Featherstone persuaded him
to join him in his mercantile business, for it had outgrown
his capital and Reid's money was just what was wanted.
Sometimes Mr. Allston or some of his family came to
Lawrenceville, and Caroline came with them. Sometimes
Reid rode out there Saturday evening and spent the
Sabbath. And so the love affair progressed smoothly, and
when Caroline was sweet sixteen
they were married at Mr. Featherstone's house in the
good old town of Lawrenceville. When Caroline was asked
why she married so young, she always said, "Why, I didn't
dare to refuse. He was my teacher, and I was taught to
obey him."
Well, now, we will skip over some more. In course of
time two children were born to them, two fine, handsome
boys, and Caroline was happy, always happy, except at
times when the image of her lost brother came before her.
Reid had already advertised for him in all of the
Southern papers and in New York and Philadelphia. One
day when he came home he found that she had been
weeping, and he resolved to make one more effort. So he
sent an advertisement to a Boston paper and one to St.
Louis and New Orleans.
Now, let us go back to the little town of Randolph and
see what Mr. Wales is doing. It was Sunday morning, and
he was not feeling well and did not go to church. He had on
his gown and slippers and cap and had laid down on the
sofa to read his Boston paper. That advertisement was
almost the first thing that caught his eye.
"James F. Maguire, whose parents died of yellow fever
in Charleston in the summer of 1815, and who was
separated from his only sister, Caroline, during the panic,
can hear from her by addressing the undersigned at
Lawrenceville, Georgia. She is well and happy."
Wales read it and re-read it, and suddenly realizing what
it meant rose up, and, with the paper in his hand, rushed
wildly across the street to Maguire's house. Nobody was
there. They had all gone to church, which was only two
blocks away. Wales did not stop, but hurried up the street
and into the side
door of the church, which was near the Maguire pew.
The minister had begun to read the hymn but Wales never
stopped nor considered his apparel, but cried out in a
delirium of joy, "Maguire, I've found your sister. Thank God
I have. Here she is sure, and is alive and well. Thank the
good Lord for his mercies," and being overcome with his
own emotions he sat down and wept. The minister stopped,
of course, and came down to hear the paper read. Half the
congregation gathered near while Maguire read the
advertisement, and had others read it aloud. He trembled
like an aspen leaf and said, "That is Caroline and no
mistake. Bless the Lord for his goodness unto me," and he
knelt down in silent prayer and sobbed in tears of joy, for
tears are signs of joy as well as grief.
Enough of that. You young people, whose hearts are
tender and full of emotions, must imagine the rest, and you
will be more ready to believe that when the Lord said over
and over again in the scriptures, "I am the God of the
fatherless and the widow," He meant it.
Now, this is about all of my story except that I have
failed to mention that Reid's name was Asahel Reid Smith.
He was my father, and Caroline was my own dear mother.
I was seven years old then, and cannot forget the delirious
joy of that meeting after a separation of eighteen years. My
brother James was nine years old, and our uncle had two
boys of a like age with us. For years the brother and sister
and their children visited and re-visited each other. Their
eldest son, in course of time, established a branch of his
father's shoe business at Melbourne, Australia. The last
letter from him said that he had married a sweet English
lady and
And now a brief mention of my wife and myself--my
birth and youth and manhood. On the 15th day of June,
1826, half a million children were born into the world and I
was one of them. In the pleasant village of Lawrenceville,
Gwinnett county, Georgia, I first saw the light. My infancy
was not unlike that of other children, except that sometimes
I had little fits of passion and threw myself upon the floor or
bumped my head against the wall, at which my mother
smiled and sometimes said I couldn't help it, for it was
South Carolina fighting Massachusetts. My childhood was
happy, and so were my school days. I still have fond
recollections of my teachers. Miss Cooley, an aunt of Mrs.
George Hillyer's, was the first one. She was good and kind
to us all. Then came Dr. Wilson and Mr. Sayre, John
Norton and Dr. Patterson and Mr. McAlpin in succession. I
was a mischievous lad, and Mr. Norton whipped me
occasionally--not hard but lightly--once he whipped me on my
boil and bursted it, and nearly broke my mother's heart, but
it was good for the boil. My teachers are all dead. A few
years ago old Father Sayre called to see me in Chester, S. C.,
and as he grasped my hand said, "Yes, you went to
school to me, and I never whipped you but once. Perhaps if
I had whipped you more you would have made a better
man--but I am proud of you, my boy. Yes, I am proud of
you."
In course of time I was sent to the manual labor institute,
two miles away, where I mingled with the boys of the best
families of the State. The Gouldings, Holts, Hoyles, Allans,
Alexanders, Lintons and Crawfords and others. They are all
dead but two that I know of. My father was a merchant, and
when I was nearly grown he gave me a clerk's place in his
store, and I sold goods for two or three years. About this
time of course I fell in love, and dressed better and brushed
my hair with a cowlick touch and wore boots and smiled
sweetly on my sweethearts as they passed. When I was
nineteen I was sent to college at Athens, and found a new
sweetheart there. She played and toyed with me while she
was secretly engaged to another fellow. When I was senior
my father was taken seriously ill, and called me home to take
charge of his business. So I went to selling goods again. In
the meantime a pretty, hazel-eyed lassie I had only known
as a child had grown out of her pantalets and into long
dresses, and was casting sly glances at the boys about town.
I imagined she cast some at me, for she liked to trade at my
store and was in no hurry to go, and was pleased to buy
what I advised her and never asked the price. She was a
bashful brunette, with hair as black as that of Pocahontas,
and it is yet, and her name was Mary Octavia, the eldest
daughter of Judge Hutchins. Of course it didn't take me long
to fall desperately in love, - nor did it take a long siege for me
to take that fort, for I was a right handsome youth myself,
and was smart and doing well. What better does a pretty girl
want? Yes, I found that pearl, and did not throw it away like
Othello. I've got it yet. From the beginning I knew that she
loved me, and I never had to plead or get on my knees--
nor did I ever ask her to have me, but one moonlight night
as we were walking I said, "Octavia, when shall we get
married?" and, as she pressed my hand, she whispered,
"Whenever you think best." It was like the murmur of a
dream, but I heard it. Now she will deny all this, but
nevertheless it is the truth, and so within three months we
were wedded. I knew very well that with her parents I was
an acceptable lover, for my mother had found it out from
her mother, and everything was calm and serene. She was
sweet sixteen and I was twenty-one. I took her young,
thinking I could train her to suit my notion, but she soon
trained me to suit her's.
Now, my young friends, that was nearly fifty-four years
ago. I was one of ten children; my wife was one of ten. We
have ten all living, and they have just twenty, and just keep
on multiplying and replenishing according to scripture. My
brothers are dead. I have three sisters living, who are very
dear to me. Well, I built a little cottage in a pretty grove and
we moved there. Judge Hutchins had a large plantation on
the river, and over a hundred slaves. He did not offer us any
money, for he knew we did not need it, but sent up two of
the favorite family servants, and Tip, the same faithful Tip
of whom I have written, was one of them. They begged old
master to give them to "Miss Tavy," and he did so. A few
months after our marriage Judge Hutchins insisted that I
should study law, for he needed a young man's help in his
office. So I placed my mercantile interests in other hands
and began to peruse Blackstone. In two or three months I
was admitted to the bar on promise of continuing my studies,
which promise I kept, and in due time began to ride the
circuit at the tail of the procession. And what
a procession it was! Judge Junius Hillyer, Judge Jackson,
the Doughertys, Hope Hull, Howell Cobb and his brother,
Tom Cobb, Cincinnatus Peeples, Basil Overby, and meeting
occasionally Robert Tombs and Alex Stephens. All great
lawyers and eloquent, both in the forum and on the
platform. They are all dead, and I, only I, am left. Then
there were the Judges of the Supreme Court, Lumpkin,
Warner and Nisbet, whom I well knew, for somehow all of
these noble men made a pet of me, and from them I drew
inspiration and knowledge.
In 1851 I took the Western fever, and moved to Rome to
grow up with the town and the country. I was soon
associated with Judge Underwood in the practice of law,
and for thirteen years we were as intimate as brothers. The
war came and we parted. After the, war I became
associated with Judge Joel Branham, another most
delightful partnership, which was only severed by his
elevation to the bench.
And now in my old age I cannot say as Jacob said to
Pharaoh, "Few and evil have been the days of the years of
my pilgrimage." We have had more than our share of
blessings. We have been blessed with health and the
comforts of life. Of course the war made an inroad upon
our peace and happiness for a time, but the good Lord
preserved us and we suffered no dire calamity or affliction.
My motto is that of the Latin poet,
"Carpe diem," enjoy the
day, enjoy every day as far as possible.
We have been blessed in our children, for they have been
good to us. Our boys are all in good form and feature - not a
single deformity to mar their manhood. Our girls are modest
and well favored. Not a Leah among them - all are Rachels--all are
frugal and industrious, and love their paternal home. It is
their Mecca, and will be until we die.
For twenty-seven years we lived in Rome and prospered.
Then we retired to a beautiful little farm near Cartersville,
where there were springs and branches, a meadow and a
creek near by, with a cane-brake border. Not far away was
a mill and a pond, and there was a mountain in the background
where small game abounded. There we raised
Jersey cows and colts and sheep and chickens and
peafowls, and lived well by day and feasted on music by
night, for every member of the family is a musician, which
art they inherited from their mother. It was a lovely home,
and all the younger children grew up there to manhood and
womanhood, and were happy. Their schooling was not
neglected, though I could not send but one boy and one girl
to college. It was on the farm that the boys learned what a
dollar was worth when they earned it.
But by and by and one by one the boys left us for other
avocations, and five of the six now live in five different
States from New York to Mexico. As I had to be away a
good portion of my time, my wife and daughters were left
without a protector, so I moved to this town of Cartersville
and bought this pleasant home, which we call "The
Shadows," because it is embowered by the shade of many
beautiful trees. This is all. We are still in the land of the
living, where mercy may be sought and pardon found.
Enough of this. It savors of self-conceit and vanity to
write so much about myself, and I feel that what I am or
what I have done should be told by another. But what is
writ is writ.
NOTE.--Some of "Bill Arp's" friends wish that he had been less modest,
diffident and unassuming, it being a favorite contention that with the
assurance, self-laudation and pretentious aggressiveness of the times,
supported by his profound knowledge and philosophic temperament, he
could have attained high political honors or achieved the loftiest eminence
in our judiciary. Others who love him better prefer him as he was and is. He
could not be as he is if he had not been as he was. The "Cherokee
Philosopher" is dearer to us than would be the Chief Justice of the Supreme
Court, or "governor," or "senator," or "Mr.
President." We love him for
the offices he has avoided, the political entanglements he has escaped.
While there are millions struggling for political office, from a
doorkeepership in a police court to the Presidency "Bill Arp" stands alone
in the dignity of a personal office to which he has been elected by a
universal suffrage of hearts touched and mellowed by a physical sympathy
wholly unknown in the field of political stress and strain. He is the elect of
a people who could see no other possible candidate for the place he fills. He
is neither soiled nor spoiled, except by the little tenderness of legions who
seek opportunity to show a sort of filial reverence for the patriarch. Mrs.
Arp knows his faults, chief of which is that he likes to be petted. The
introduction he received at Tupelo, Miss., most tenderly expresses his
relation to the Southern people. The speaker said in conclusion, "I cannot
say that Bill Arp is the greatest man nor the best man, nor the most
eloquent man, but I can truthfully say that he is the best loved man in all
the Southland."
"All the world's a stage, and all the men and
women merely players."
The civil war was a play, a thrilling tragedy, in which
great armies were the players and the world the witnesses.
But in every play there are performances behind the scenes
that the footlights do not shine upon nor the audience have
any knowledge of. There are prompters and properties,
dressing and undressing, false hair and false faces, weapons
and banners, and machinery for thunder and lightning.
There is hurrying to and fro, and sometimes subdued
altercations, jealousies and envyings. Sometimes there is
real rivalry and real love transpiring behind the scenes while
it is mimicked and played in front. The acts and deeds of
mankind are behind the scenes. The greater part of life--the
better part and the worse - is invisible to the world. Our
domestic relations, fireside pleasures, family dissensions, our
joys and sorrows, desires and ambitions, yes, our secret
thoughts that harbor hate or cherish love are all behind the
scenes, known only to a few or to ourselves alone.
I propose now to touch briefly upon some things that
were behind the scenes before and during the civil war--
some things that have not been published and which
present a vivid contrast to the glory of a
soldier's life. These are war times and it is well enough to
exhibit the picture to the young men of the South and let
them ponder upon it and draw the line between a war of
patriotic duty and one of conquest and glory. This part of
my address will be brief and is intended chiefly for the
entertainment of the veterans who still live, for you know
that while the capital stock of youth is hope, that of age is
memory.
Early in the year 1861, when secession was the great
and vital question that agitated our people, a convention
was called to decide whether Georgia would follow South
Carolina's lead, or not. All of the young men,
nearly all of the women, and many of the
old men, were outspoken for secession, even though it
provoked war. There was a party, however, with Alexander
Stephens as a leader, who preferred co-operation and did
not wish Georgia to secede alone, but favored a convention
of delegates from all the Southern States and let them all go
out together or remain in the Union. This party, however,
was too feeble to stem the tide of resistance to Northern
aggression, and so the delegates from every county
gathered at the capital.
There was a Union element among the delegates. It was
composed of old men who had property and did not wish it
imperiled by war, and there were some non-slaveholders,
who were not in sympathy with the slaveholders' policy or
alarmed by their fears.
There were a few strong men who were for the old flag
and the Union above all other considerations. Of this class
Herschel Johnson was the leader. He was one of the great
men of Georgia. He was on the ticket for Vice-President
when Stephen A. Douglass ran for President. He was a
man of sluggish, ponderous
mind, not easily excited by ordinary events, but
when aroused from his lethargy by some vital issue he had
no equal in Georgia. He was called the sleeping Sampson,
and his political foes used all their arts to keep him asleep.
He was opposed to secession, and went as a delegate to the
convention. Toombs and his party dreaded him and feared
the power of his eloquence. "Old Sampson is aroused,"
said Toombs, "and the boys must look out." Johnson began
to speak just before twelve and was fairly getting under
way, and knocking out the props upon which secession
leaned, when he was interrupted by Albert Lamar, the
secretary and a suggestion made to adjourn for dinner. At
the dining wine was served, and Johnson, being pressed by
Lamar and his friends, drank too freely. He lost his mental
balance and the remainder of his speech fell flat and tame
and unfinished. After his death, Lamar, who was editor of
the Macon Telegraph, wrote up the unwritten fraud and
published it, boasting how he drugged the wine at the dinner
table, and that if it had not been done the old lion would
have carried the majority of the delegates with him as easily
as a tornado carries the trees in its track. "But for those two
drinks," said Lamar, "Georgia would not have seceded and
there would have been no war."
Whether this be true or not true is of no great concern,
for if no war then it would have come later. There was no
averting it as long as the negro was here in slavery.
And so Georgia seceded and prepared for war, and her
sister States followed in quick succession. While the new
regiments were forming the State was one vast recruiting
camp. The call of the drum resounded from mountain to
seaboard. Men, women
and children participated in the general enthusiasm. Beautiful
banners were being made by womanly fingers and presented
to the companions with womanly benedictions. Why is it, my
friend, why is it, that loving, pitying, tender-hearted women,
who will not willingly tread upon a worm, are always first and
foremost in urging their husbands, brothers, sons, to battle for
their country or their section? It is a fact that but for the
smiles of mothers, wives, sisters and sweethearts, Georgia
would never have sent 100,000 soldiers to the front. I did not
visit Virginia, in June, 1861, with any intention of joining the
army, but I did join while there and knew full well that my
wife would weep but still be proud of it. Her five brothers
were already there, and the wonder of it is that she was not
there herself, playing the role of Joan of Arc. But she had a
lively time of it at home three years later and saw enough of
war, for she had to flee from the foul invader with five little
children tagging after her. She paused in Atlanta, but only for
a day--just long enough to catch breath and start again. Then
she made a good, long run down to Tuskegee, in the secluded
shades of Alabama, the State whose beautiful name means
"here we rest." But it was no resting place for her, for
Wilson's raiders were on the wild hunt for rebels and
refugees, and so she departed those coasts with alacrity and
sought retreat and safety at her father's plantation on the
upper Chattahoochee. She left almost everything behind her
when she fled from Rome that dark and dismal night. The
house was full of furniture, the pantry full of good things, the
smoke-house full of meat and lard and a barrel of home-made
soap. I believe she made more ado about losing that soap than
anything, for she had made it
in the dark of the moon and stirred it from left to right with
a sassafras paddle while it was boiling,
But in her wild haste
she forgot some things that were very precious. She forgot
the package of love letters that I wrote her during my
courtship, in which I promised many things that she declares
I have ceased to perform since she lost them. She forgot
the letters that I wrote home from the army, many of them
containing graphic descriptions of the battles and who of our
boys were killed and who were wounded, and they were
read aloud to the people from her front door as soon as she
received them. I would give money for those letters now.
She forgot her album - her maiden's treasure, in which her
friends and lovers, including myself, had written tender
verses. These were all given up as lost, but in December,
1884, she received the album, with these lines inscribed on
the last page:
"FRANKLIN, PA., Dec. 22d, 1884.
"With pleasure I return this book to its rightful owner. I
came in possession of it while marching through Georgia
with Sherman's army. I became attached to it for the
sentiment contained in the verses, and I sent it to a lady
friend, Miss Downs, in Sparta, Ohio. She married and
moved away and has just returned the book to me after
twenty years' possession. My wish is that the rightful
owner may preserve its pages and hand it down to
posterity.
Respectfully,
"E. A. Wilson."
That man is a gentleman, if he did belong to Sherman's
army, but it took him a long time to reform.
Shortly after I joined the army, I was appointed brigade
commissary on the staff of General Bartow. I had no
military forms or papers, no money where
with to purchase supplies, and I had not yet drawn or issued
a single ration, for I had just been appointed. I was green,
and was waiting for money and advices to come from
Richmond. After we had crossed the Shenandoah river,
General Bartow told me to ride on ahead until I reached
Marshall, a small village, and there procure some fresh meat
and some bacon for the boys to cook and eat when they
arrived. "General," said I, timidly, "how will I get these
things? I have no money to buy them with." "My dear sir,"
said he, "you must remember that this is war and everything
in this country owes tribute to the army. Look around
Marshall for three or four fat cattle--everything is fat up
here--buy them at a fair price, and give the owner a receipt
and a certificate and tell him to bring it to me when I get
there and I will approve it so that he can draw his money at
Richmond. Buy some good bacon, also, say a thousand
pounds. The boys will want it to cook with their beef. This is
war, I tell you."
About that time I began to realize what war was, and
that the civil law was silent, dead or sleeping, and that
nobody had any rights save the generals and their officers.
When I arrived at Marshall I found a farmer unloading
corn, and he had the finest, fattest yoke of oxen attached to
his wagon that I ever saw. I stopped and saluted him.
"Those are fine steers," said I, "what would buy them?"
"Well, about one hundred dollars, I reckon," he replied. Then
I made known my business, and soon found that he would
not sell, nor would he take any scrap of paper on this here
Southern Confederacy, as he called it. The argument was
soon exhausted and time was precious. By this time some
butchers from the First
Kentucky Regiment had arrived and were ready for
work. I pointed out the steers to them, and before
the farmer could say Jack Robinson they had them
unyoked and were leading them to the branch.
Amazement, indignation, anger, took it by turns over
his features; then he began to use language--cuss
words and expletives in abundance. Suddenly he
swore he'd ruther die than be run over in any such
way, army or no army. Then he cried and wiped
the tears away with his coat sleeve. His last exclamation
was, "How in the hell am I to get my wagon
home?" I was awfully sorry for that man. My
hope is that he got his pay from the Federal government
after the war. Well, I got the bacon without
any trouble, for the merchant was a red-hot rebel
and made me eat dinner with him. Those great
oxen were killed and butchered and cut up into
small mess pieces in less time than I can tell about it.
Wood was hauled up and camp fires built, and by
dark our brigade of four thousand men were full and
had tumbled down to sleep.
Well, I soon learned that war was war, and in course of
time I could impress provisions with but little scruples of
conscience. One time I impressed four hundred barrels of
flour from a Union sympathizer in Orange county who had
a merchant mill and was waiting to sell it to the Yankees for
greenbacks. His wife was a genuine rebel woman and
treated me so kindly on the sly that I gave back two
hundred barrels of it. It was a case of Nabel and Abigail.
Impressment of provisions was nothing compared with
the conscription of men and forcing them to fight and face
the enemy, willing or unwilling, whether they were brave
men or cowards. There
was the case of Jacob Wise, a rich Jew who lived in Rome
and had neither wife nor children. When the conscription
officers came to Rome he secreted himself, and one night
came to my house about midnight in tears. Trembling, he
said, "Major, I vas porn a coward; I could not fight a lettle
poy nor a von arm seek man. My legs vill turn around and
run avay mid me efery time. I vas porn shust dot vay, and I
will pay big money if you vill keep me out of his old war. Oh,
mine Gott; oh, Abraham; oh, Isaac and Yacup." He excited
my sympathies so much that I undertook to befriend him.
There was an examining board then sitting in the town, of
whom Dr. Starr of Rome was the chairman. He was my
friend and knew Wise well, and so I brought Wise over to be
examined. Wise was ready to swear that he had consumption
and rheumatism and epilepsy and apoplexy and Bright's
disease and heart disease and any other disease; but I juggled
with Starr and we agreed that Wise should pay $5,000 to the
county fund for the support of poor soldier's wives and
children, and be discharged. Wise never hesitated a moment.
Dr. Starr filled up a printed blank and named the disease for
which he was discharged in these Latin words: "Non
controlus shankus in combatibus"--can't control his legs in battle.
When we returned home, Wise paid the money over to the
county treasurer and I gave him the certificate of discharge,
but never explained the meaning of his remarkable disease.
But neither victories nor defeats are to be compared to
the horrors of battle, the things that are behind the scenes
and are never published. During the seven days' fight
across the Chickahominy, hundreds of the dead were
hastily buried in trenches,
buried head to foot a foot or so under the surface, and the
earth heaped over them; for you must know, my friends,
that on a battlefield there are neither shrouds nor graves,
nor coffins nor mourners.
Heavy rains came on and softened that earth to mud and
when a few, days later, our wagons had to cross that field,
the wheels sank to the hubs when crossing the trenches and
sometimes a leg, sometimes an arm, and sometimes a
ghastly skull was thrown up, as if beseeching for mercy.
Another graphic scene I witnessed the night after the battle
of Manassas. The hospital chosen was a large brick building
near the battle-ground. It was property that had been
vacated under military orders. But the surgeons' operating
room was not there. It was in a willow glade, not far away,
where there was a clear spring branch flowing peacefully
along. Dr. Miller ordered all the wounded brought there, for
the night was beautiful and the water convenient. All night
long he and his assistants amputated arms and legs, and
probed for balls, and used bandages and splints and other
appliances, and as fast as one man was fixed up he was
taken away and the doctor said "Next!" like in a barber
shop. But there was no groaning. The boys were heroes
under the surgeon's knife as well as on the battle-field. I
remember when Jett Howard, of Kingston, limped up
without assistance and the doctor said, "What's the matter
with you, Jett?" Jett pointed to where a minie ball had
penetrated his hip and said he could feel it on the other side.
Quickly the doctor thrust a probe into the wound, and as
quickly drew it out, and turning Jett around, and sound for
the ball under the skin, he found it. With his knife he cut an
opening and thrusting in his finger pulled out the ball and
gave it to him. "Here's your diploma, Jett," he said. "Next!"
Jet limped away with a smile and had his wound dressed.
When my brother-in-law, Captain Cooper, was brought up
with a shattered leg, his knee pan crushed and his bones
mangled, the doctor said, "Fred, this leg must come off
immediately," and he reached for his knife and saw."Stop,
doctor," exclaimed Fred, "can't you save my leg?" "No; it is
impossible," said he, "it must come off, I tell you." "Doctor,
is there a possible chance for me to save this leg?" "Perhaps,"
said the doctor, "one chance in a hundred, but I
warn you now that if it is not speedily cut off you will be a
dead man in two weeks." Captain Cooper was full of nerve
and faith. "Doctor, I will take that chance," he said; and the
doctor said "Next!" Fred was taken to the hospital that night
and died in two weeks.
Poor Tom King's leg was broken, and while it was being
splinted he was laughing and joking like a school boy. He
lost only sixty days from the service and lived only to die at
Chickamauga.
On the sixth day of the Chickahominy fight, when
McClellan was in full retreat, our brigade commander,
Tige Anderson, sent me down the river to General Lee's
headquarters for some instructions about moving the
brigade. I found him in a large wall tent with many officers
around him. This tent opened into another where the camp
tables were set for dinner and the servant bringing it in.
There were four or five large camp tables joined together,
and as I sat upon my horse awaiting a reply, I saw a man,
an officer, whose head and body were underneath the right hand
table and his feet out upon the straw. His slouched hat was over
his head and eyes, his sword was unbuckled, and his boots
were on and
spurred. His Confederate gray clothes seemed faded and
worn. My curiosity was greatly excited, and when the
adjutant handed me the instructions, I ventured to point to
the sleeping man and to ask, "Who is he?" "That is
Stonewall," he said; "he has had no sleep for forty-eight
hours and fell down there exhausted. General Lee would
not suffer him to be disturbed, and so our dinner will be
eaten over him and in silence." Reverently I gazed upon
him for a minute, for I felt almost like I was in the presence
of some divinity. What a scene for a painter was that--the
two greatest generals of the army, yes, of the age, together;
one asleep upon the straw, worn out with fatigue and
excitement, the camp tables set above him; while the other,
with his staff, dined in silence over him and watched his
needed rest. Both of them were patriots and Christians, and
both of them were men of prayer.
With them there were
no selfish motives behind the
scenes, but every act and deed and thought was for God
and their country. I have long been grateful that I
witnessed that scene, the bivouac of a sleeping hero, and I
love to recall Palmer's beautiful lines:
"We
see him now--he old slouched hat
Cocked
over his eye askew,
The
shrewd, dry smile, the speech so pat,
So
calm, so blunt, so true.
The
blue light elder knows 'em well;
Says
he, "That's Banks. He's fond of shell
Lord
save his soul. Now give him--," well,
That's
Stonewall Jackson's way.
Silence,
ground arms, kneel all, caps off;
Old
Blue Light's going to pray.
Strangle
the fool who dares to scoff
At
Stonewall Jackson's way.
He's in the saddle; now fall in,
Steady, the whole brigade;
Hill's at the ford, cut off. Let's win
Him out with ball and blade.
Ah, maiden, wait, and watch and yearn
For news of Stonewall's band;
Ah, widow, read with eyes that burn
That ring upon thy hand.
Ah, wife, sew on, pray on, hope on,
Thy life shall not be all forlorn;
The foe had better ne'er been born,
That gets in Stonewall's way.
With many people on the border line, their loyalty rested
on very delicate pivots. Which shall I work for, pray for, or
fight for, was a serious and perplexing question. Fathers
were separated from sons, and brothers from brothers.
Mrs. Lincoln was a Miss Todd, of Kentucky, and all her
brothers were in the Confederate service. I knew one of
them well, for he was for months on the staff of our corps
commander. He was of no force, just an ornament, and
made himself disagreeable by his abuse of Old Abe, his
brother-in-law. Mrs. Grant was interviewed last year in
Saint Augustine and said her sympathies were with the
South, but her interest was with her husband's choice. With
many West Pointers there was no patriotic emotion.
Fighting was their profession, and position, pay and
promotion their coveted reward. General Geo. C. Thomas,
one of the ablest Federal generals, was a class-mate of
General Joe Johnston, and like him was a Virginian of the
Virginians. When Johnston was made a major-general by
Mr. Davis, Thomas sought a similar position, but was told
the places were all filled and he would have to wait. He did
not wait, but was soon after offered that position by Mr.
Lincoln and accepted it. General
Johnston told me of this at my house in '67 and was
greatly mortified. General Grant had no sympathy with the
anti-slavery feature of the war, for he was a slave-holder
himself and hired them out in St. Louis until sometime after
Mr. Lincoln's proclamation of freedom to the slaves. You
will find more about this in Appleton's Cyclopedia of
American Biography, wherein is published a letter from
General Grant's father, in which he says, "My son, Ulysses,
was very improvident before the war and frequently
applied to me for money. In the fall of 1860 he begged me
to lend him $500, as he was in pecuniary distress. I wrote to
him that I could not do it, and I thought the income from the
rent of his house and the hire of his negroes ought to
support him, but if he was suffering he had better go to
Galena and work for his brother in the tan-yard. This he did,
and got along fairly well till the war began and he got a
good position in the army."
What a blessed thing is peace and law and order, for, as
Ben Franklin said, "There never was a good war, nor a bad
peace." The contest was too unequal to last longer. Seven
hundred thousand could not cope longer with two million,
seven hundred thousand. There were many blunders on
both sides, and much good blood was wasted, and there
were some pivotal points on which turned tremendous
results on the side of the South. Prominent among them
was the death of Albert Sidney Johnston at Shiloh, the
failure of Huger to come in time and cut off McClellan's
retreat at Malvern Hill, the death of Stonewall Jackson, the
invasion of Pennsylvania, and the removal of General
Johnston at Atlanta. But, no doubt, the will of God was
done. Time is a good doctor. We are learning to know each
other better, both
North and South, and to tolerate each other's opinions and
prejudices. All that is now necessary to make the
reconciliation complete is for the North to put our heroes
and Confederate widows on the pension rolls, just as they
have theirs. Most all of ours are dead; only seventy
thousand are left of all our army; but there are a million
pensioners on the rolls up North, and as time rolls on they
grow more thicker, more denser-as Cobe would say.
"Time cuts down all,
Both great and small,
Except a pensioned soldier;
They do not die,
But multiply
As fast as they grow older."
Now, if the North will do that, and apologize, we will be
calm and serene.
Before the civil war our Southern civilization was divided
into two classes--the aristocracy and the common people.
The aristocrats were generally slave-holders, and though
they were only one-seventh of the voting population, they
dominated the other six-sevenths politically, socially, and
financially. And yet there was no friction. The common
people were loyal to their wealthy and educated leaders.
They voted for them and fought for them. They elected
them to our highest offices. These aristocrats were our
governors, judges, and members of Congress, our
civil and military office-holders. And they were shining
lights in the councils of the nation. The common
people were allowed to be magistrates, constables and
non-commissioned officers in the militia. They
served on the petit juries and worked the public roads.
Their loyalty to the aristocracy was beautiful. They shouted
for Toombs and Stephens, and Colquitt and Cobb, with a
wild hurrah, and when the war came they fought for their
principles just like our forefathers fought who resisted a tax on tea
when not one in a thousand drank it. Out of a company of eighty-four
men who went from Murray county, not one was a
slave-holder. The aristocracy was mainly an aristocracy of
dominion. This kind of aristocracy brings with it culture and
pride and dignity of bearing. The scriptures always mention the
number of servants when speaking of the old patriarchs'
consequence in the land. "I am a man having authority,"
said the Centurion. "I say unto this man, go, and he goeth,
and to another, come, and he cometh." Dominion is the
pride of man--dominion over something. A negro is
proud if he owns a "possum" dog. A poor man is proud if he
owns a horse and a cow and some razor-back hogs. His
neighbor is proud if he owns a good horse and a top buggy
and some bottom land and can take the lead in his country
church or his county politics. The big boy loves dominion
over his little brother, and the father takes it over all--well,
not always, for there are some wives who have a sweet and
silent control over their husbands; I speak from experience.
Bob Toombs once remarked, "That the dominion of a good
wife over her husband was his surest safeguard" against
the temptations of life. Toombs was a very great and noble
man, and the most beautiful trait of his character was his
loyalty and devotion to his wife.
But the Anglo-Saxon race glories in owning men, and it
makes but little difference whether the men are their
dependents or their slaves; the glory is all the same if they
have got them in their power. Wealthy corporations, railroad
kings, princely planters, have dominion over their employees
and they control them at their pleasure. It is not a dominion
in law, but it is almost absolute in fact, and there is nothing
wrong about it when it is humanely exercised; indeed, it is a
very agreeable relation between the poor laborer and the
rich employer. An humble, poor man loves to lean upon a
generous landlord, and the landlord is proud of the poor
man's homage. I asked Bill A. once how he was going to
vote, and he said he couldn't tell me until he saw Colonel
Johnson.
But the dominion of the old aristocracy of the South
was not over their own race. It was over another, and it
gradually grew into an oligarchy of slave-owners, and the
poorer whites were kept under the ban. There was a line
of social caste between them, and it was widening into a
gulf, for the poor white man could not compete with slave
labor any more than the farmer or the mechanic can now
compete with convict labor. But, at the same time, this kind
of slave aristocracy gave dignity and leisure to the rich, and
Solomon says: "In leisure there is wisdom;" and so these
men became our law-makers and jurists, and they were
shining lights in the councils of the nation. But, my friends, it
was an aristocracy that was exclusive, and it overshadowed
the masses of the people like a broad spreading oak
overshadows and withers the undergrowth beneath it. The
results of the war wiped out this distinction between the
aristocrat and the common people. But there are still left
two classes--those who have seen better days, and those
who haven't. The first class used to ride or drive, but most
of them now take it afoot or stay at home. Seventy-five per
cent. of them are descendants of old Henry Clay Whigs.
Forty and fifty years ago they were the patrons of high
schools and colleges, and stocked the professions with an
annual crop of high-strung graduates who swore by Henry
Clay and Fillmore and Stephens and Toombs and John Bell
and the Code of Honor. They were proud of their birth and
lineage, their wealth and culture; and when party spirit ran
high and fierce they banded together against the pretensions
of the struggling democracy. When I was a young man, a
Whig girl deemed it an act of condescension to go to a
party with a Democrat boy. But
the wear and tear of the war, the loss of their slaves, and a
mortgage or two to lift, broke most of these old families up,
though it didn't break down their family pride. They couldn't
stand it like the Democrats who lived in log cabins and wore
wool hats and copperas breeches. I speak with freedom of
the old Georgia democracy, for I was one of them. The
wealth and refinement of the State was, in the main,
centered in the party known as the Old Line Whigs. Out of
one hundred and sixty student in our State University at
Athens, fifty-five years ago, one hundred and thirty of them
were the sons of Whigs. I felt politically lonesome in their
society, and was just going to change my base when I fell in
love with a little Whig angel who was flying around. This
hurried me up, and I was just about to go over to the Whig
party, when suddenly that party came over to me. I don't
know yet whether that political somersault lifted me up or
pulled the little angel down--but I do know she wouldn't have
me, and at last I mated with a Democratic darling who had
either more pity or less discrimination. She took me, and
she's got me yet; she surrendered, but I am the prisoner.
So I did not marry my first love, but Mrs. Arp married
her's--bless her heart--and she now declares I took advantage
of her innocent youth and gave her no chance to make a
choice among lovers. That is so, I reckon, for I was in a
powerful hurry to secure the prize, and pressed my suit with
all diligence for fear of accidents. Once before I had loved
and lost, and I thought it would have killed me; but it didn't,
for I never sprung from suicide stock. I had loved that little
maid of Athens amazingly. I would have climbed the
Chimborazo mountains and
fought a tizer for her--a small tiger. And she loved me, I
know, for the evening before I left for my distant home I
told her of my love and devotion, my adoration and
aspiration and admiration and all other "ations," and the
palpitating lace on her bosom told me how fast her heart
was beating, and I gently took her soft hand in mine and
drew her head upon my manly shoulder and kissed her.
Delicious feast--delightful memory. It lasted me a year, I
know, and hasn't entirely faded yet. I never mention it at
home - no never; but I think of it sometimes on the sly--yes,
on the sly. Before I left her for my distant home she
promised to consider my love and write to me--but she never
wrote. She is considering it yet, I reckon. In a year or so
she married another college boy and was happy, and not
long after I married Mrs. Arp, and was happy, too. So it is
all right and no loss on our side.
I still love to ruminate about those delightful days--the
memories of love's young dream. And why not? Four
thousand years ago Jacob kissed Rachel, and Moses made
a record of it in the sacred volume, and it has come down to
us through the corridors of time, and is still the sweetest
part of the story. To be mated as well as married is the
happiest condition of human life. What a beautiful sight it is
to see a venerable couple with loving children and
grandchildren around them, and going down the vale like
John Anderson my Jo John and his loving spouse. It seems
to me that marriage in those days, half a century ago, were
more serious than now. I will not say there was more love,
but I know there were less clothes and fewer divorces and
grass widows. The boys married the girls and the girls
married the boys. But now it is not uncommon to see our
old widowers
following General Longstreet's example, and taking
the girls for wives. It is not according to nature and is
dangerous to both, especially if the old man refuses to die in
a reasonable time and fails to leave the blooming widow a
goodly sum. I recall now a beautiful Gwinnett girl, the
daughter of a friend of ours. The civil war wrecked her
father's fortune and he died soon after, leaving her almost
penniless. When she was twenty years old she wedded a
rich old man of fifty - an invald, whose lease on life seemed
short - and he settled on her an ample fortune to be hers at
his death. Now she is fifty years old and he is eighty, and
keeps living on and on and on. They are childless, and live
on a farm in the country, and she looks almost as old and
haggard as he does. Hers is the wreck of a once happy and
hopeful life.
Now, before the civil war, our young men almost
invariably mated with our young girls, and our widowers
married widows as a general rule, unless there was a
Yankee school mistress in sight. They always married
Southern widowers, and were glad to get them. Four New
England girls went off that way in my town, and they made
good wives and good mothers. They were raised to habits of
industry and economy, and that is what a widower wants in
a second wife. They take good care of his first crop of
children and get them educated and out of the way by the
time the second crop is coming on. There was no economy
in ante-bellum days among the aristocracy of the South. It
wasn't necessary. The little negroes were always standing
around waiting for the scraps, either of food or clothing.
Whereas, in New England, where I went to school one
winter, they didn't even keep a dog or a cat at my uncle's
house, and the rule was to take no more on your plate
than you were going to eat, and the dishes and the plates
were left so clean after meals that it was hardly necessary
to wash them--and maybe they didn't.
Most of these families are poor, but they are
proud. They are highly respected for their manners and
their culture. They are looked upon as good stock and
thoroughbred, but withdrawn from the turf. Their daughters
carry a high head and a flashing eye, stand up square on
their pastern joints, and chafe under the bits. They come
just as nigh living as they used to as possible. They dress
neatly in plain clothes, wear starched collars and corsets,
and a perfumed handkerchief. They do up their hair in the
fashion, take Godey's Lady's Book or somebody's Bazaar.
If they are able to hire a domestic, the darkey finds out in
two minutes that free niggers don't rank any higher in that
family than slaves used to. The negroes who know their
antecedents have the highest respect for them, and will say
Mas' William or Miss Julia with the same deference as in
former years. One would hardly learn from their general
deportment that they cleaned up the house, made up the
beds, washed the dishes, did their own sewing and gave
music lessons--in fact, did most everything but wash the
family clothes. They won't do that. I have known them to
milk and churn, and sweep the back yard, and scour the
brass; but I've never seen one of them bent over the
washtub yet. In the good old times their rich and patriarchal
father lived like Abraham, and Jacob, and Job. They felt
like they were running an unlimited monarchy on a limited
scale. When a white child was born in the family it was ten
dollars out of pocket; but a little nigger was a hundred
dollars in and got fifty dollars a year better for twenty
years to come.
The economy of the old plantation was the economy of
waste. Two servants to one white person was considered
moderate and reasonable. In a family of eight or ten--with
numerous visitors and some poor kin--there was generally a
head cook and her assistant, a chamberhaid, a seamstress, a
maid or nurse for every daughter, and a little nig for every
son, whose business it was to trot around after him and hunt
up mischief. Then there was the stableman and carriage
driver, and the gardener and the dairy woman, and two little
darkies to drive up the cows and keep the calves off while
the milking was going on. Besides these, there were
generally half a dozen little chaps crawling around or picking
up chips, and you could hear them bawling and squalling all
the day long, as their mothers mauled them and spanked
them for something or nothing with equal ferocity.
But the good old plantation times are gone--the times
when these old family servants felt an affectionate abiding
interest in the family; when our good mothers nursed their
sick and old, helpless ones, and their good mothers waited so
kindly upon their "mistis," as they called her, and took care
of the little children by day and by night. Our old black
mammy was mighty dear to us children, and we loved her,
for she was always doing something to please us as she
screened us from many a whipping. It would seem an
unusual wonder, but nevertheless it is true, that these faithful
old domestics loved their master's children better than their
own, and they showed it in numberless ways without any
hypocrisy. We frolicked with their children, and all played
together by day and hunted together by night, and it beat the
Arabian Nights to go to the old darkey's cabin of a winter
night and hear him tell of ghosts and witches
and jack-o' lanterns, and wildcats and grave yards, and raw
head and bloody bones, and we would listen with faith and
admiration until we didn't dare to look around, and wouldn't
have gone back to the big house alone for a world of
gold. Bonaparte said that all men were cowards at night,
but I reckon it was these old darkies that made us so, and we have
hardly recovered from it yet. When I used to go a-courting I had to
pass a grave-yard in the suburbs of the little village, and it
was a test of my devotion that I braved its terrors on the darkest night
and set at defiance the wandering spirits that haunted my path. Mrs.
Arp appreciated it, I know, for she would follow me to the
door when I left and anxiously listen to my retiring footsteps;
and she declares to this day she could hear me
running up that hill by the graveyard like a fast trotting
horse on a shell road. The slaves of that day were loyal
to their masters, and in the main were happy and contented.
Of course there were some bad negroes, and there
were some bad masters. Alas for the negro! Before the
war there was not an outrage committed by them from
the Potomac to the Rio Grande. There was not a chaingang
nor a convict camp in all the South. Now, there are five
thousand in the chain-gangs of Georgia and fifteen
thousand more in the Southern States. here would
be fifty thousand if the laws were enforced for
minor offences, but we overlook them out of pity.
What a blessed privilege it was for the boys of our
day to go with the cotton wagons to market, and camp out
at night, and hear the trusty old wagoners tell their
wonderful adventures. What a glorious
time when we got home again, and brought sugar, and
coffee and molasses, and had shoes all around
for white and black, with the little wooden measures in
them and the names written on every one. And we had
Christmas, too, for white folks and black folks; little red
shawls, and head handkerchiefs, jack knives and jews-harps,
tobacco and pipes, were always laid up for the
family servants.
The times have wonderfully changed since then--
some things for better, some for worse. The old
aristocracy is passing away. Some of them escaped
the general wreck that followed the war and have
illustrated by their energy and liberality the doctrine
of the survival of the fittest-but their name is
not legion. A new and hardier stock has come to
the front--that class which prior to the war was
under a cloud, and are now seeing their better days.
The pendulum has swung to the other side. The results
of the war made an opening for them and developed
their energies. With no high degree of culture
they have nevertheless proved equal to the
struggle up the rough hill of life, and now
play an important part in running the financial
machine. Their practical energy has
been followed by thrift. They have proved
to be our best farmers and most prosperous
merchants and mechanics. They now constitute the
solid men of the State, and have contributed largely
to the building up of our schools and churches, our
factories and railroads, and the development of our
mineral resources. They are shrewd and practical
and not afraid of work. The two little ragged brothers
who sold peanuts in Rome in 1860 are now her
leading merchants. Two young men who then clerked
for a meagre salary are now among the merchant
prices of Atlanta. These are but types of the modern,
self-made Southerner--a class who form a most
striking contrast to the stately dignity and aristocratic
repose of the grand old patriarchs and statesmen whose
beautiful homes adorned the hills and groves of the South
some forty years ago.
But the children of the old patricians have come down
some, and the children of the common people have come up
some, and they have met upon a common plane and are
now working happily together, both in social and business
life. Spirit and blood have united with energy and muscle,
and it makes a splendid team--the best all-round team the
South has ever had.
Some time in the spring of 1861, when our Southern boys
were hunting for a fight, and felt like they could whip all
creation, Mr. Lincoln issued a proclamation ordering us all
to disperse and retire within thirty days, and to quit
cavorting around in a hostile and belligerent manner.
I remember writing an answer to it as though I was a
good Union man and law-abiding citizen, and was willing to
disperse, if I could; but it was almost impossible, for the
boys were mighty hot, and the way we made up our military
companies was to send a man down the lines with a bucket
of water and sprinkle the boys, as he came to 'em, and if a
feller sizzed like hot iron in a slack trough, we took him, and
if he didn't sizz, we didn't take him; but still, nevertheless,
notwithstanding, and so forth, if we could possibly disperse
in thirty days we would do so, but I thought he had better
give us a little more time, for I had been out in an old field
by myself and tried to disperse myself and couldn't do it.
I thought the letter was right smart, and decently
sarcastic, and so I read it to Dr. Miller and Judge
Underwood, and they seemed to think it was right smart,
too. About that time I looked around and saw Bill Arp
standing at the door with his mouth open and a merry
glisten in his eye. As he came forward, says he to me:
"Squire, are you gwine to print that?"
"I reckon I will Bill," said I. "What name are ye gwine
to put to it?" said he. "I don't know yet," said I; "haven't
thought about a name." Then he brightened up and said:
"Well, 'Squire, I wish you would put mine, for them's my
sentiments;" and I promised him that I would.
So I did not rob Bill Arp of his good name, but took it on
request, and now, at this late day, when the moss has
covered his grave, I will record some pleasant memories of
a man whose notoriety was not extensive, but who filled up
a gap that was open, and who brightened up the flight of
many an hour in the good old times, say from forty to fifty
years ago.
He was a small, sinewy man, weighing about one
hundred and thirty pounds, as active as a cat, and always
presenting a bright and cheerful face. He had an amiable
disposition, a generous heart, and was as brave a man as
nature ever makes.
He was an humble man and unlettered in books; never
went to school but a month or two in his life, and could
neither read nor write; but still he had more than his share
of common sense; more than his share of good mother wit,
and was always welcome when he came about.
Lawyers and doctors and editors, and such gentlemen of
leisure who used to, in the olden time, sit around and chat
and have a good time, always said, "Come in, Bill, and take
a seat;" and Bill seemed grateful for the compliment, and
with a conscious humility squatted on about half the chair
and waited for questions. The bearing of the man was one
of reverence for his superiors and thankfulness for their
notice.
Bill Arp was a contented man--contented with his humble
lot. He never grumbled or complained at
anything; he had desires and ambition, but it did not
trouble him. He kept a ferry for a wealthy gentleman who
lived a few miles above town on the Etowah river, and he
cultivated a small portion of his land; but the ferry was not of
much consequence, and when Bill could slip off to town and
hear the lawyers talk he would turn over the boat and the
poles to his wife or his children and go. I have known him to
take a back seat in the courthouse for a day at a time, and
with face all greedy for entertainment listen to the learned
speeches of the lawyers and charge of the court, and go
home happy and be able to tell to his admiring family what
had transpired. He had the greatest reverence for Colonel
Johnson, his landlord, and always said that he would about as
leave belong to him as to be free; "for," said he, "Mrs.
Johnson throws away enough old clothes and second-hand
vittels to support my children, and they are always nigh
enough to pick 'em up."
Bill Arp lived in Chulio district; we had eleven districts in
the county, and they had all such names as Pop-skull, and
Blue-gizzard, and Wolf-skin, and Shake-rag, and Wild-cat,
and Possum-trot, but Bill lived and reigned in Chulio. Every
district had its best man in those days, and Bill was the best
man in Chulio. He could out-run, out-jump, out-swim,
out-rastle, out-ride, out-shoot anybody, and was so far ahead
that everybody else had given it up, and Bill reigned
supreme. He put on no airs about this, and his nabors were
all his friends.
But there was another district adjoining, and it had its
best man, too. One Ben McGinnis ruled the boys of that
beat, and after awhile it began to be whispered around that
Ben wasn't satisfied with his limited territory, but would like
to have a small
tackle with Bill Arp. Ben was a pretentious man. He
weighed about 165 pounds, and was considered a regular
bruiser. When Ben hit a man he meant business, and his
adversary was hurt--badly hurt, and Ben was glad of it.
But when Bill Arp hit a man he was sorry for him, and if he
knocked him down he would rather help him up and brush
the dirt off his clothes than swell around in triumph. The quicker
a man whips a fight the less of it he has to do, and both
Ben and Bill had settled their standing most effectually.
Bill was satisfied with his honors, but Ben was not, for
there was many a Ransy Sniffle who lived along
the line between the districts, and carried news from the
one to the other, and made up the coloring, and soon it was
narrated around that Ben and Bill had to meet and settle it.
The court-grounds of that day consisted of a little log
shanty and a shelf. The shanty had a dirt floor
and a puncheon seat, and a slab for the 'Squire's docket,
and the shelf was outside for the whiskey.
The whiskey was kept in a gallon jug, and that held
just about enough for the day's business. Most every body
took a dram in those days, but very few took
too much, unless, indeed, a dram was too much. Pistols
were unknown, and bowie-knives and brass-knuckles and
sling-shots and all other devices that gave one man an artful
advantage over another.
When Colonel Johnson, who was Bill Arp's landlord, and
Major Ayer and myself got to Chulio, Bill Arp was there,
and was pleasantly howdying with his nabors, when
suddenly we discovered Ben McGinnis arriving upon the ground.
He hitched his horse to a swinging limb and dismounted
and began trampoosing around, and every little crowd he got to,
he would lean forward in an insolent manner and say, "Any
body here got anything agin Ben McGinnis? If they have, I
goll, I'll give 'em five dollars to hit that; I golly, I dare
anybody to hit that," and he would point to his forehead with
an air of insolent defiance.
Bill Arp was standing by us and I thought he looked a
little more serious than I ever had seen him. Frank Ayer
says to him, "Bill, I see that Ben is coming around here to
pick a fight with you, and I want to say that you have got no
cause of quarrel with him, and if he comes, do you just let
him come and go, that' all." Colonel Johnson says, "Bill, he is
too big for you, and your own beat knows you, and you
haven't done anything against Ben, and so I advise you to let
him pass; do you hear me?"
By this time Bill's nervous system was all in a quiver. His
face had an air of rigid determination, and he replied
humbly, but firmly, "Colonel Johnson I love you, and I
respect you, too; but if Ben McGinnis comes up here outen
his beat, and into my beat, and me not having done nothing
agin him, and he dares me to hit him, I'm going to hit him, if
it is the last lick I ever strike. I'm no phist puppy dog, sir,
that he should come out of his deestrict to bully me."
I've seen Bill Arp in battle, and he was a hero. I've seen
him when shot and shell rained around him, and he was cool
and calm, and the same old smile was upon his features, but
I never saw him as intensely excited as he was that
moment when Ben McGinnis approached us, and,
addressing himself to Bill Arp, said, "I golly, I dare anybody
to hit that."
As Ben straightened up, Bill let fly with his hard, bony
fist right in his left eye, and followed it up with another so
quick that the two blows seemed as one. I don't know how
it was, and never will know; but in
less than a second, Bill had him down and was on him, and
his fists and his elbows and his knees seemed all at work.
He afterwards said that his knees worked on Ben's bread
basket, which he knew was his weakest part. Ben hollered
"enough" in due time, which was considered honorable to do
when a feller had enough, and Bill helped him up and
brushed the dirt off his clothes, and said, "Now, Ben, is it all
over betwixt us, is you and me all right?" And Ben, said,
"It's all right 'twixt you and me, Bill; and you are much of a
gentleman." Bill invited all hands up to the shelf, and they
took a drink, and he and Ben were friends.
This is enough of Bill Arp--the original, the simon-pure.
He was a good soldier in war. He was the wit and the wag
of the camp-fires, and made a homesick youth laugh away
his melancholy. He was a good citizen in peace. When told
that his son was killed he looked no surprise, but simply said:
"Major, did he die all right?" When assured that he did, Bill
wiped away a falling tear and said, "I only wanted to tell his
mother."
You may talk about heroes and heroines; I have seen all
sorts, and so has most everybody who was in the war, but I
never saw a more devoted heroine than Bill Arp's wfe. She
was a very humble woman, very, and she loved her
husband with a love that was passing strange. I have seen
that woman in town, three miles from her home, hunting
around by night for her husband, going from one saloon to
another, and in her kind, loving voice inquiring, "is William
here?" Blessings on that poor woman; I have almost cried
for her many a time. Poor William, how she loved hm.
How tenderly would she take him, when she found him,
and lead him home, and bathe
his head and put him to bed. She always looked
pleased and thankful when asked about him, and
would say, "he is a good little man, but you know
he has his failings." She loved Bill and he loved
her; he was weak and she was strong. There are
some such women now, I reckon. I know there are
some such men.
"Big John" was one of the earliest settlers of Rome, and
one of her most notable men. For several years he was
known by his proper name of John Underwood; but when
another John Underwood moved there, the old settler had to
be identified by his superior size, and gradually lost his
surname, and was known far and near as "Big John." The
new comer was a man of large frame, weighing about 225
pounds, but Big John pulled down the scales at a hundred
pounds more. He had shorter arms and shorter legs, but his
circumference was correspondingly immense. He was
notable for his humor and his good humor. The best town
jokes came from his jolly, fertile fancy, and his comments
on men and things were always original, and as terse and
vigorous as ever came from the brain of Dr. Johnson. He
was a diamond in the rough. He had lived a pioneer among
the Indians of Cherokee, and it was said fell in love with an
Indian maid, the daughter of old Tustenuggee, a limited
chief, and never married because he could not marry her.
But if his disappointment preyed upon his heart, it did not
prey long upon the region that enclosed it, for he continued
to expand his proportions. He was a good talker and an
earnest laugher--whether he laughed and grew fat, or grew
fat and laughed, the doctors could not tell which was the
cause and which was effect, and it is still in
doubt, but I have heard wise men affirm that laughing
was the fat man's safety-valve, that if he did not laugh and
shake and vibrate frequently, he would grow fatter and
fatter, until his epidermic cuticle could not contain his
oleaginous corporosity.
Big John had no patience with the war, and when he
looked upon the boys strutting around in uniforms, and fixing
up their canteens and haversacks, he seemed as much
astonished as disgusted. He sat in his big chair on the
sidewalk, and would remark, "I don't see any fun in the like
of that. Somebody is going to be hurt, and fighting don't
prove anything. Some of our best people in this town are kin
to them fellers up North, and I don't see any sense in
tearing up families by a fight." He rarely looked serious or
solemn, but the impending strife seemed to settle him.
"Boys," said he, "I hope to God this thing will be fixed up
without a fight, for fighting is a mighty bad business, and I
never knowed it to do any good."
Big John had had a little war experience--that is, he had
volunteered in a company to assist in the forcible removal of
the Cherokees to the far west in 1835. It was said that he
was no belligerent then, but wanted to see that the maiden
he loved had a safe transit, and so he escorted the old chief
and his clan as far as Tuscumbia, and then broke down and
returned to Ross Landing on the Tennessee river. He was
too heavy to march, and when he arrived at the Landing, a
prisoner was put in his charge for safe keeping. Ross
Landing is Chattanooga now, and John Ross lived there, and
was one of the chiefs of the Cherokees. The prisoner was
his guest, and his name was John Howard Payne. He was
suspected of trying to instigate the Cherokees to revolt and
fight, and not
leave their beautiful forest homes on the Tennessee and
Coosa and Oostanaula and the Etowah, or New Town, as it
was called, an Indian settlement on the Coosawattee, a few
miles east of Calhoun, as now known. There he kept the
author of "Home, Sweet Home" under guard, or on his
parol of honor, for three weeks, and listened to his music
upon the violin, and heard him sing his own songs until
orders came for his discharge, and Payne was sent under
escort to Washington.
Many a time have I heard Big John recite his sad
adventures. "It was a most distressive business," said he.
"Them Injuns was heart-broken; I always knowed an Injun
loved his hunting-ground and his rivers, but I never knowed
how much they loved 'em before. You know they killed
Ridge for consentin' to the treaty. They killed him on the
march and they wouldn't bury him. The soldiers had to stop
and dig a grave and put him away. John Ross and John
Ridge were the sons of two Scotchmen, who came over
here when they were young men and mixed up with these
tribes and got their good will. These two boys were splendid
looking men, tall and handsome, with long auburn hair, and
they were active and strong, and could shoot a bow equal to
the best bowman of the tribe, and they beat 'em all to
pieces on the cross-bow. They married the daughters of the
old chiefs, and when the old chiefs died they just fell into
line and succeeded to the old chiefs' places, and the tribes
liked 'em mighty well for they were good men and made
good chiefs. Well, you see Ross dident like the treaty. He
said it wasent fair, and that the price of the territory was
too low, and the fact is he dident want to go at all. There
are the ruins of his old home now over there in DeSoto,
close to Rome, and I tell you he was a king. His word
was the law of the Injun nations, and he had their love and
their respect. His half-breed children were the purtiest
things I ever saw in my life. Well, Ridge lived up the
Oostanaula river about a mile and he was a good man, too.
Ross and Ridge always consulted about everything for the
good of the tribes, but Ridge was a more milder man than
Ross, and was more easily persuaded to sign the treaty that
gave the lands to the State and take other lands away
across the Mississippi.
"Well, it took us a month to get 'em all together and begin
the march to the Mississippi, and they wouldn't march then.
The women would go out of line and set down in the Woods
and go to grieving, and you may believe it or not, but I'll tell
you what is a fact, we started with 14,000, and 4,000 of 'em
died before we got to Tuscumbia. They died on the side of
the road; they died of broken hearts; they died of starvation,
for they wouldn't eat a thing; they just died all along the
way. We didn't make more than five miles a day on the
march, and my company didn't do much but dig graves and
bury Injuns all the way to Tuscumbia. They died of grief
and broken hearts, and no mistake. An Indian's heart is
tender and his love is strong; it's his nature. I'd rather risk
an Injun for a true friend than a white man. He is the best
friend in the world, and the worst enemy. He has got more
gratitude and more revenge in him than anybody."
Big John's special comfort was a circus. He never
missed one, and it was a good part of the show to see him
laugh and shake and spread his magnificent face.
He took no pleasure in the quarrels of mankind, and
never backed a man in a fight; but when two dogs locked
teeth, or two bulls locked horns, or two game chickens
locked spurs, he always liked to be about. "It is their nature
to fight," said he, "and let 'em fight." He took delight in
watching dogs and commenting on their sense and
dispositions. He compared them to the men about town, and
drew some humorous analogies. "There is Jimmy Jones,"
said he, "who ripped and splurged around because Georgia
wouldn't secede in a minute and a half, and he swore he
was going over to South Carolina to fight; and when
Georgia did secede shore enough, he didn't join the army at
all, and always had some cussed excuse, and when
conscription came along, he got on a detail to make potash,
con-ding him, and when that played out he got him a couple
of track dogs and got detailed to catch runaway prisoners.
Just so I've seen dogs run up and down the palings like they
was dying to get to one another, and so on
