Chapter 17
Chapter 17 of Company H by Sam R. Watkins. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. The Surrender. The Last Act of the Drama. On the tenth day of May 1861, our regiment, the 1st Tennessee, left Nashville for the camp of instruction with 1,250 men, officers, and line. Other recruits continually coming in swelled this number to 1,400. In addition to this, Major Fulker's
battalion of four companies with 400 men originally was afterwards attached to the regiment, and the 27th Tennessee regiment was afterwards consolidated with the 1st. And besides this, there were about 200 conscripts added to the regiment from time to time. To recapitulate, the 1st Tennessee numbering originally 1,250, recruited from time to time 150, Fulker's battalion 400, the 27th
Tennessee 1,200, number of conscripts at the lowest estimate 200, making the sum total 3,200 men that belonged to our regiment during the war. The above, I think, a low estimate. Well, on the 26th day of April 1865, General Joe E. Johnson surrendered his army at Greensboro, North Carolina. The day that we surrendered our regiment, it was a pitiful sight to behold. If I remember correctly, there
were just 65 men in all, including officers that were paroled on that day. Now what had become of the original 3,200? A grand army, you may say, 3,200 men. Only 65 left. Now, reader, you may draw your own conclusions. It lacked just four days of four years from the day we were sworn in to the day of the surrender, and it was just four years and 24 days from the time that we left home
for the army to the time that we got back again. It was indeed a sad sight to look at, the old 1st Tennessee regiment. A mere squad of noble and brave men gathered around the tattered flag that they had followed in every battle through that long war. It was so bullet-riddled and torn that it was but a few blue and red shreds that hung drooping while it, too, was stacked with
our guns forever. Thermopylae had one messenger of defeat, but when General Joe E. Johnson surrendered the Army of the South, there were hundreds of regiments, yea, I might safely say thousands, that had not a representative on the 26th day of April 1865. Our cause was lost from the beginning. Our greatest victories, Chickamauga and Franklin, were our greatest defeats. Our people were
divided upon the question of union and secession. Our generals were scrambling for who ranked. The private soldier fought and starved and died for naught. Our hospitals were crowded with sick and wounded, but half provided with food and clothing to sustain life. Our money was depreciated to naught and our cause lost. We left our homes four years previous. Amid the waving of flags
and handkerchiefs and the smiles of the ladies, while the fife and drum were playing Dixie and the bonnie blue flag, we bid farewell to home and friends. The bones of our brave southern boys lie scattered over our loved South. They fought for their country, and they gave their lives freely for that country's cause. And now they who survive sit like Marius amid the wreck of Carthage,
sublime, even in ruins. Other pens, abler than mine, will have to chronicle their glorious deeds of valor and devotion. In these sketches I have named but a few persons who fought side by side with me during that long and unholy war. In looking back over these pages, I ask, where now are many whose names have appeared in these sketches? They are up yonder, and are no doubt
waiting and watching for those of us who are left behind. And, my kind reader, the time is coming when we too will be called, while the archangel of death is beating the long roll of eternity, and with us it will be the last revelry. God himself will sound the assembly on yonder beautiful and happy shore, where we will again have a grand reconfederation. We shed a tear over their
flower-strewn graves. We live after them. We love their memory yet. But one generation passes away, and another generation follows. We know our loved and brave soldiers. We love them yet. But when we pass away, the impartial historian will render a true verdict, and a history will then be written in justification and vindication of those brave and noble boys who gave their all in fighting the
battles of their homes, their country, and their God. The United States has no north, no south, no east, no west. We are one and undivided. Adieu. My kind friends, soldiers, comrades, brothers all, the curtain is rung down, the footlights are put out, the audience is all left and gone home, the seats are vacant, and the cold walls are silent. The gaudy tinsel that appears before the
footlights is exchanged for the dress of the citizen. Coming generations and historians will be the critics as to how we have acted our parts. The past is buried in oblivion. The blood-red flag with its crescent and cross that we followed for four long bloody and disastrous years has been folded, never again to be unfurled. We have no regrets for what we did. But we mourn the loss of
so many brave and gallant men who perished on the field of battle and honor. I now bid you an affectionate adieu. But in closing these memoirs the scenes of my life pass in rapid review before me. In imagination I am young again tonight. I feel the flush and vigor of my manhood. I'm just 21 years of age. I hear the fife and drum playing Dixie and Bonnie Blue Flag. I see and hear our fire-eating
stumperators tell of the rite of secession and disunion. I see our fair and beautiful women waving their handkerchiefs and encouraging their sweethearts to go to the war. I see the marshalling of the hosts for glorious war. I see the fine banners waving and hear the cry everywhere, two arms, two arms. And I see our country at peace and prosperous. Our fine cities look grand
and gay. Our fields rich and abundant harvests. Our people happy and contented. All these pass in imagination before me. Then I look and see glorious war and all its splendor. I hear the shout and charge, the boom of artillery and the rattle of small arms. I see gaily dressed officers charging backwards and forwards upon their metal war horses clothed in the panoply of war. I see victory and
conquest upon flying banners. I see our arms triumph in every battle. And oh my friends, I see another scene. I see broken homes and broken hearts. I see war and all its desolation. I see a country ruined and impoverished. I see a nation disenfranchised and maltreated. I see a Commonwealth forced to pay dishonest and fraudulent bonds that were issued to crush that people. I see sycophants
licking the boots of their country's oppressor. I see other and many wrongs perpetrated upon a conquered people. But maybe it is but the ghosts and phantoms of a dreamy mind or the wind as it whistles around our lonely cabin home. The past is buried in oblivion. The mantle of charity is long ago fallen upon those who think differently from us. We remember no longer wrongs and injustice
done us by anyone on earth. We are willing to forget and forgive those who have wronged and falsified us. We look up above and beyond all those petty groveling things and shake hands and forget the past. And while my imagination is like the weaver's shuttle playing backward and forward through these two decades of time, I ask myself, are these things real? Did they happen? Are they
being enacted today? Or are they the fancies of the imagination and forgetful reverie? Is it true that I have seen all these things? That they are real incidents in my life's history? That I see those brave and noble countrymen of mine laid low in death and weltering in their blood? That I see our country laid waste and in ruins? That I see soldiers marching, the earth trembling and jarring
beneath their measured tread? That I see the ruins of smoldering cities and deserted homes? That I see my comrades buried and see the violet and wild flowers bloom over their graves? That I see the flag of my country that I had followed so long, furled to be no more unfurled forever? Surely they are but the vagaries of my own imagination. Surely my fancies are running wild tonight. But
hush, I now hear the approach of battle. That low rumbling sound in the west is the roar of cannon in the distance. That rushing sound is the tread of soldiers. That quick lurid glare is the flash that precedes the cannons roar. And listen, that loud report that makes the earth tremble and jar and sway is but the bursting of a shell as it screams to the dark tempestuous night. That black ebb and
cloud where the lurid lightning flickers and flares that is rolling through the heavens is the smoke of battle. Beneath is being enacted a carnage of blood and death. Listen, the soldiers are charging now. The flashes and roaring now are blending with the shouts of soldiers and the confusion of battle. But reader, time has brought his changes since I, a young ardent and
impetuous youth, burning with a lofty patriotism, first shouldered my musket to defend the rights of my country. Lifting the veil of the past, I see many manly forms, bright in youth and hope, standing in view by my side in Company H, 1st Tennessee Regiment. Again I look and half those forms are gone. Again and gray locks and wrinkled faces and clouded brows stand before me. Before me too, I
see not an imagination but in reality my own love, Jenny. The partner of my joys and the sharer of my sorrows, sustaining, comforting, and cheering my pathway by her benignant smile. Pouring the sunshine of domestic comfort and happiness upon our humble home, making life more worth the living as we toil on up the hill of time together with the bright pledges of our early and constant love by our side
while the sunlight of hope ever brightens our pathway, dispelling darkness and sorrow as we hand in hand approach the valley of the great shadow. The tale is told. The world moves on. The sun shines as brightly as before. The flowers bloom as beautifully. The birds sing their carols as sweetly. The trees nod and bow their leafy tops as if slumbering in the breeze. The gentle winds
fan our brow and kiss our cheek as they pass by. The pale moon sheds her silvery sheen. The blue dome of the sky sparkles with the trembling stars that twinkle and shine and make night beautiful. And the scene melts and gradually disappears forever. End of chapter 17
End of company H by Sam R Watkins Recording by Winston Tharp
