DEATH OF LIEUTENANT JOHN WHITTAKER
At this place we built small breastworks, but for what purpose I never knew. The Yankees seemed determined not to fight, no way we could fix it. Every now and then they would send over a "feeler," to see how we were getting along. Sometimes these "feelers" would do some damage. I remember one morning we were away over a hill, and every now and then here would come one of those lazy-looking "feelers," just bouncing along as if he were in no hurry, called in military "ricochet." They were very easy to dodge, if you could see them in time. Well, one morning as before remarked, Lieutenant John Whittaker, then in command of Company H, and myself were sitting down eating breakfast out of the same tin plate. We were sopping gravy out with some cold corn bread, when Captain W. C. Flournoy, of the Martin Guards, hallooed out, "Look out, Sam; look! look!" I just turned my head, and in turning, the cannon ball knocked my hat off, and striking Lieutenant Whittaker full in the side of the head, carried away the whole of the skull part, leaving only the face. His brains fell in the plate from which we were sopping, and his head fell in my lap, deluging my face and clothes with his blood. Poor fellow, he never knew what hurt him. His spirit went to its God that morning. Green Rieves carried the poor boy off on his shoulder, and, after wrapping him up in a blanket, buried him. His bones are at Jonesboro today. The cannon ball did not go twenty yards after accomplishing its work of death. Captain Flournoy laughed at me, and said, "Sam, that came very near getting you. One-tenth of an inch more would have cooked your goose." I saw another man try to stop one of those balls that was just rolling along on the ground. He put his foot out to stop the ball but the ball did not stop, but, instead, carried the man's leg off with it. He no doubt today walks on a cork-leg, and is tax collector of the county in which he lives. I saw a thoughtless boy trying to catch one in his hands as it bounced along. He caught it, but the next moment his spirit had gone to meet its God. But, poor John, we all loved him. He died for his country. His soul is with his God. He gave his all for the country he loved, and may he rest in peace under the shade of the tree where he is buried, and may the birds sing their sweetest songs, the flowers put forth their most beautiful blooms, while the gentle breezes play about the brave boy's grave. Green Rieves was the only person at the funeral; no tears of a loving mother or gentle sister were there. Green interred his body, and there it will remain till the resurrection. John Whittaker deserves more than a passing notice. He was noble and brave, and when he was killed, Company H was without an officer then commanding. Every single officer had been killed, wounded, or captured. John served as a private soldier the first year of the war, and at the reorganization at Corinth, Mississippi, he, W. J. Whitthorne and myself all ran for orderly sergeant of Company H, and John was elected, and the first vacancy occurring after the death of Captain Webster, he was commissioned brevet second lieutenant. When the war broke out, John was clerking for John L. & T. S. Brandon, in Columbia. He had been in every march, skirmish, and battle that had been fought during the war. Along the dusty road, on the march, in the bivouac and on the battlefield, he was the same noble, generous boy; always, kind, ever gentle, a smile ever lighting up his countenance. He was one of the most even tempered men I ever knew. I never knew him to speak an unkind word to anyone, or use a profane or vulgar word in my life.
One of those ricochet cannon balls struck my old friend, N. B. Shepard. Shep was one of the bravest and best soldiers who ever shouldered a musket. It is true, he was but a private soldier, but he was the best friend I had during the whole war. In intellect he was far ahead of most of the generals, and would have honored and adorned the name of general in the C. S. A. He was ever brave and true. He followed our cause to the end, yet all the time an invalid. Today he is languishing on a bed of pain and sickness, caused by that ball at Jonesboro. The ball struck him on his knapsack, knocking him twenty feet, and breaking one or two ribs and dislocating his shoulder. He was one of God's noblemen, indeed— none braver, none more generous. God alone controls our destinies, and surely He who watched over us and took care of us in those dark and bloody days, will not forsake us now. God alone fits and prepares for us the things that are in store for us. There is none so wise as to foresee the future or foretell the end. God sometimes seems afar off, but He will never leave or forsake anyone who puts his trust in Him. The day will come when the good as well as evil will all meet on one broad platform, to be rewarded for the deeds done in the body, when time shall end, with the gates of eternity closed, and the key fastened to the girdle of God forever. Pardon me, reader, I have wandered. But when my mind reverts to those scenes and times, I seem to live in another age and time and I sometime think that "after us comes the end of the universe."
I am not trying to moralize, I am only trying to write a few scenes and incidents that came under the observation of a poor old Rebel webfoot private soldier in those stormy days and times. Histories tell the great facts, while I only tell of the minor incidents.
But on this day of which I now write, we can see in plain view more than a thousand Yankee battle-flags waving on top the red earthworks, not more than four hundred yards off. Every private soldier there knew that General Hood's army was scattered all the way from Jonesboro to Atlanta, a distance of twenty-five miles, without any order, discipline, or spirit to do anything. We could hear General Stewart, away back yonder in Atlanta, still blowing up arsenals, and smashing things generally, while Stephen D. Lee was somewhere between Lovejoy Station and Macon, scattering. And here was but a demoralized remnant of Cheatham's corps facing the whole Yankee army. I have ever thought that Sherman was a poor general, not to have captured Hood and his whole army at that time. But it matters not what I thought, as I am not trying to tell the ifs and ands, but only of what I saw. In a word, we had everything against us. The soldiers distrusted everything. They were broken down with their long days' hard marching—were almost dead with hunger and fatigue. Every one was taking his own course, and wishing and praying to be captured. Hard and senseless marching, with little sleep, half rations, and lice, had made their lives a misery. Each one prayed that all this foolishness might end one way or the other. It was too much for human endurance. Every private soldier knew that such things as this could not last. They were willing to ring down the curtain, put out the footlights and go home. There was no hope in the future for them.