Confederate wizards of the saddle /

by Bennett H. Young

This one book must, in the very nature of things, be limited to a few hundred pages.

It does not and cannot undertake to tell all that was glorious and courageous in the service of the men who led and composed the Confederate cavalry. There will doubtless be some who will ask why certain battles and experiences were omitted. The author may have selected, in some instances, what would appear to many critics and readers not the most notable events in the Confederate cavalry work.

He may have inadvertently left out names that ought to have been mentioned, campaigns that were of vast importance, and battles that were full of sublime sacrifice and marked by the superbest skill.

The book is written with the bias of a cavalry man. It is written by a man who knows, by personal experience only, some of the things that happened where Forrest, Wheeler and Morgan fought. He only knew personally three of the men whose leadership and skill are detailed in the book. He never saw Stuart but once, and Forrest a few times, but he loves the fame of all these splendid men and has endeavored to do each the fullest justice.

There were one hundred and four Confederate generals, from brigadier up, who at various times led the horsemen of the South. A volume could be written of the services of each. A majority of them were equally brave and valiant, but fate decreed some should pass under the fiercest light, and win from fame its most generous awards. It may be that hereafter other volumes will be written to tell, if not who, what the Confederate horsemen were. One of the chiefest aims of this volume is to give Confederate cavalry leaders and their followers their just place in the history of the great war. There is neither purpose nor desire to take aught from any other branch of the service. The Confederate infantry, artillery and navy have each a distinct place in the struggle of the South for its national life. Every Confederate loves every other Confederate and glories in all that he did to win the immortality of the Confederate armies. The cavalryman asks that his work may be recognized and that his proper place shall be assigned him in the phalanxes of the brave who stood for Southern independence. He covets none of the fame that justly belongs to his comrades in other lines. He only seeks that what he did may be honestly told, and his achievements be truly recorded. He feels that he did the best that he could and that he is entitled to a complete narrative of that which he did and endeavored to do for his country. He does not claim that he was braver or more patriotic than his comrades who fought in other departments. He only asks that the world may know the dangers he had faced, the difficulties he overcame, the sacrifices he made, the sufferings he endured and the results his work accomplished. A true account is his only demand, and all the world will feel that this is his right.

The writer may not always be literally accurate in the things he undertakes to recount in this book about Southern cavalry. He may here and there have made slight mistakes in the description of the marches and battles he has essayed to describe. Relying upon books and participants, he could not always get the things just as they occurred. Eye witnesses often differ in discussing the same occurrence. There are hundreds of dates and names recorded in these pages. Error must have crept in, but in the main the history is what really happened, and these happenings alone will give Confederate cavalry fame and renown in all ages and amongst all nations.

They make up a great history of great leaders and valiant soldiers, and they must surely add something to the store of human heroism.

There is no desire to depreciate what men on the other side did. In the later years of the war, the Federal cavalry apprehended the tactics and the methods of Confederate horsemen, and they became foemen worthy of any steel. The third year of the struggle, the mounts of the Southern cavalry became less efficient and the disparity in arms and supplies more and more depressing amongst the Confederates. The Federal generals undertook then to cut Confederate lines of communication, and to destroy their commissary depots and to disrupt railway transportation. In such work, in 1864 and 1865, they laid heaviest burdens on the Confederate cavalry; and in many instances the jaded and starving horses, the illy-fed men, their scanty supply of ammunition put them at great disadvantage, but they were, in face of all these difficulties, game, vigilant, aggressive, enterprising and defiant to the end; and from April, 1864, to April, 1865, there was nothing more brilliant nor historic than the work of the Confederate horsemen, performed under the most unfavorable conditions, to stay the tide of Federal advance and success and to maintain to the end their nation’s hope and their nation’s life.

If the sketches these pages contain shall add one leaf to the Confederate Laurel Wreath, or bring to Confederate fame fuller recognition, the author will be many times repaid for the labor, expense and time expended in their preparation.

Bennett H. Young.