Soon after starting from Atlanta on General Wheeler’s second raid into Middle Tennessee, in 1864, I resolved to go into Gallatin, my home and native place, and see my family, from whom I had been absent for more than two years. I knew that Gallatin had been occupied by the Federal forces a long time, and that the commandants of the place, Payne and then Scarret, had been placed there for their well-known disposition to lord it over a helpless and noncombatant population. Many outrageous crimes had been committed by them, and scores of Confederate soldiers had been brutally murdered for no other reason than that they sought to see their dear ones again. The darkest chapter in our War between the States could be written under this head. I was fully posted then of the hazard of such an undertaking; but I wanted to see my wife and little boy (who was but a few weeks old when I left there), and I fully determined in my own mind to risk it, as I felt convinced that this would be the last opportunity.
When the command reached the Sequatchie Valley, General Wheeler sent the Regiment down to Tracy City to take an unfinished fort that was in course of erection and to be occupied by a garrison. Fearing that we would not return in time to make my anticipated trip home, I went to Lieut. Col. Anderson, my warm-hearted and true friend, and told him how disappointed I was, disclosing to him my well-digested plan to go into Gallatin at night, stay concealed in the house all day, and return the next night, making myself unknown to any I should meet along the way. I reminded him that it might be possible to obtain valuable information for the army. The Colonel did not think my plan feasible, remarking in his nasal way: “Guild, you are certain to be killed or captured.” I told him that I had resolved to make the attempt and believed I could successfully accomplish it. He finally concluded to let me go.
Capt. Marcellus Grissim, Knot Harris, Billy Bell, and Clay Smith, Colonel Smith’s colored servant, went with me. These men all lived on this side of the Cumberland River and some distance from Gallatin, and I was the only one intending to go that far. We at once set out for Crossville, on the mountain, and then to Cookeville. Soon after leaving the Regiment we found ourselves in the country infested with the bushwhacking band of Tinker Dave Beatty, the notorious Federal jayhawker, a terror to Southern sympathizers in that part of the State, whose whole object was to kill, not to capture. On several occasions as we passed along the citizens would tell us in terrified whispers that he and some of his band had but a moment before preceded us, and death was certain if we fell into his hands, as they took no prisoners. To avoid such results, we concluded to lay by in the daytime at some secluded place and travel at night. Some very amusing things occurred during our night riding. A good many Federal soldiers belonging to Colonel Stokes’s regiment were furloughed and at home. If we chanced to meet any of these upon the road, and we sometimes would as we passed houses, we told them we were Federal soldiers and had been sent to notify them to return at once to their post at Carthage, Tenn., as it was rumored that Wheeler was coming across the mountain.
These things delayed the little squad of ours in reaching their destination. Captain Grissim’s home was in Smith County, near Rome. Before reaching there I had promised him to stay all night to rest up before I started alone for Gallatin. When I stated that we had been delayed so that I was anxious to start at once in order to get back and meet the command as it passed Lebanon, he still insisted, but I declined. Leaving my horse and Clay, the servant, with him, I started on foot to Gallatin. It was then near sundown. My first object was to get a boatman to paddle me across the river. I found much difficulty in this. I had on all my army equipment—gray uniform, two army pistols around me, and haversack in which I carried all my papers as adjutant of the Regiment. But over these I had on a long linen duster, which somewhat concealed them from view. I had determined, if I was captured, to have no evidence upon me as a spy or to disguise the fact that I was a Confederate soldier, though the old duster would easily conceal me, and I posed as a Federal soldier when asking information. I had walked some distance down the road when I overtook a man driving an ox wagon going in the same direction. I asked him if he knew where I could get some one to put me across the river. He replied that he did not, and wanted to know who I was and where I was going. I told him that I was one of Colonel Stokes’s men and had been absent on furlough at my home in the mountains; and that, having heard that the rebels were marching that way, I was hurrying to get to my command across the river. I noticed him eying me closely, and after a few words more he said to me: “Come, get up on the tongue of the cart. I don’t believe you are telling the truth; I have seen you somewhere before. You are no Yankee, but a Confederate soldier. My name is Walton. Tell me what you are after.” He spoke so frankly that I concluded at once that he would do to confide in. I got on the cart, told him who I was, and that I wanted to go to Gallatin that night and return the next; that I had left my horse and servant with Captain Grissim, and when I returned we would go over and meet General Wheeler’s command as it passed Lebanon. He knew Captain Grissim, but said: “If you go to Gallatin, you will certainly be killed. The meanest kind of an officer is in command there, and he kills every Confederate soldier he captures. Besides, I learned that they are greatly stirred up, are impressing the citizens to work in strengthening the fort, and have drawn in their picket posts close up to the town.” This was a worse state of affairs than I had anticipated; still I replied that I would attempt it. At this he said: “If you will go, get up and ride; I live about one mile down the road. Go by the house and get your supper, and I will put you across the river.” It was dark when we reached the house, and his wife had prepared supper. After supper I started; and after getting across the river, he gave me directions how to reach the Gallatin and Hartsville Turnpike, about four miles distant.
Unfortunately, after reaching the Sumner County side I remembered the house of a man whom I knew well as a most enthusiastic Southern man and in full sympathy with the Confederate cause when I left there. So I went to see him. He did not seem to know me; and when I told him my name, he still seemed not to recognize me. It was too apparent that two years of Yankee rule had wrought a change, cooling his Southern ardor; and I left him, congratulating myself that I had not told him where I was going. I fully resolved that I would make no more experiments in this direction.
I was now pretty well posted, so I continued my course toward the pike. A short distance from the pike I passed the house of another citizen whom I knew well, Mr. Carey. He was standing at his front gate, and I easily recognized him in the starlight and the candle reflection from his house, which stood near by. I passed, not intending to stop with a “Howdy-do,” when he remarked: “You seem to be traveling at a late hour and all alone.” “Yes,” I replied. “I am anxious to get to my command at Gallatin.” He spoke up quickly, remarking: “If you had been here a few minutes ago, you would have met up with scouts that stopped here, fed their horses, and got something to eat.” I asked him what direction they went, and he replied: “To Gallatin from Carthage.” He then set out and without any questions from me told me the same condition of things that my friend Walton had told me, except that he added that all the roads out of Gallatin were being scouted, as they were anticipating an attack then from Wheeler. About this time he stopped and remarked: “Listen! I can hear the horses’ feet upon the pike traveling toward Gallatin.” This was a very probable occurrence; but I could not hear them, though I seized the opportunity to start in that direction, saying: “I can probably overtake a straggling cavalryman, and I will get to ride.” I congratulated myself again, but with more satisfaction for sharpness than I did in the former interview, and with the fuller determination that this would end my interviewing of citizens and would risk all on the information I had. I am satisfied, however, that if I had confided my case to Mr. Carey he would have assisted me to the utmost extent.
I then began my travel down the pike toward Gallatin, about fourteen miles distant, stopping to listen occasionally. At Bledsoe’s Creek, six miles from the town, I stopped on the hill near the toll-gate to listen, and thought I heard the sound of horses’ hoofs on the turnpike. After waiting awhile, I moved across the bridge and, to avoid meeting any one, got over the fence with a view of traveling parallel with the pike until I came to a lane that led from the pike to Cairo, my intention being when I struck the lane to travel along it back to the pike again. When I reached the lane, I sat on the fence, and to save me I could not remember which end to take. I remember to this day my sitting there and trying to reason it out. I do not think I was asleep; but I was so exhausted from six weeks’ riding day and night that I became bewildered and chose the wrong end of the lane. When consciousness returned, I found myself near Cairo, more than a mile off of my route. I immediately turned and retraced my steps to the turnpike. When I reached it, the same bewilderment again overtook me. I stood there for some time debating with myself the way to Gallatin, and at length set out again, supposing I was right until I found myself approaching the point at Bledsoe’s Bridge which I had left more than an hour before.
I knew every foot of ground in the neighborhood, and had traveled these roads hundreds of times. My grandfather Blackmore’s farm was contiguous to them, and the people in the neighborhood were friends whom I knew and had visited. I had gone at least four miles out of my way; and looking toward the east, I could discover evidences of day breaking. I knew it would be death to be caught in that vicinity in daylight, and, tired, worn-out, and footsore, I struck a trot toward Gallatin with all the vim and strength I could command, determined not again to leave the beaten track. At Mr. Barry’s I took the old Cairo Road to Gallatin. At the Chambers farm I left it and, passing Mr. Calgy’s place, passed on to my father’s farm and house, south of Gallatin, on the Lebanon road and about half a mile from the courthouse at Gallatin. The Hartsville Pike that I traveled down approached Gallatin from the east.
As I got into the field near the house day was evidently breaking in the east. I looked toward town and saw a camp fire on Fitzgerald’s Hill, which adjoins the corporation line, and saw soldiers standing around. I knew then that this was the picket base, and that the vidette stand would be near the front gate of the yard that stood upon the next eminence in the road from the picket. The house stood on the opposite side of the road from the direction I was approaching. Thus the whole situation was before me. Concluding that there might be a foot race before the fight was over, I thought that I had better lighten myself for such an event, should it occur. As I have said, I had been carrying two large army pistols in my belt, and they had become burdensome, rubbing the skin on my side and hips till it seemed as if they were pieces of raw beef. So I concluded to conceal one of them in the fence corner and get it when I returned. I did not intend to disarm myself, and I retained one army pistol and a smaller one that I had in my haversack, a Smith & Wesson. A difficulty was the last thing I could wish for, but I wanted to be prepared for any forced defense.
I then proceeded down the fence toward the house, expecting to pass through the hedge of burdock along the pike and on to the opposite side from the house, where I remembered there was an opening covered by rails. On reaching it, I looked up and down the pike and saw the pickets about one hundred yards off, standing at the upper gate of my father’s yard fence and looking south, with their backs toward me. All seemed right at the guard post; and then, lifting myself quietly over the rails, I slipped across the road to the garden fence between the guard and vidette stand and, climbing over, fell into the garden. Another lightning process suggested itself to me—to pull off the heavy cavalry boots that I had swapped for with one of General McCook’s cavalry soldiers at Newnan, Ga., a few weeks before. They had skinned my feet till I could hardly hobble along. So, going into the summer house, I sat down on a bench and shed them, and never saw them again. I proceeded to the yard and, going around the house, saw a light burning in my mother’s room and felt then (which was a fact) that she was up with an invalid sister. I pulled up the back steps to a gallery in the rear, and, going to my mother’s room and making a smothered knock at the door, heard some one say: “Who is that?” In a low tone of voice I whispered my name, when I heard my sister exclaim: “Lord, ma, it is Brother George!” The door was opened, and I quietly entered. I could not, if I wanted to, tell what happened then. It was a sudden and unanticipated apparition. Both my mother and sister looked dazed and could not believe for a moment what they saw. If I had fallen from the skies, they could not have been more surprised. After some explanations and conversation, I asked for my wife and baby, and was told that they were on a visit to Nashville. I shall not undertake to describe the deep disappointment that this news created. I remember to have exclaimed in tones of deep despair: “Is it possible, after all, that I will not be permitted to see them?” After a little while my mother said to me: “My son, do you know the risk you are running? The soldiers are at the gate, and every day they are through the yard, and they frequently come into the house. There is not a negro about the place who would not take pleasure in informing them that you are here. The soldiers in town are expecting an attack. They are strengthening the fort in anticipation of this, and are impressing everybody that comes about town to work on the fortifications. Besides, if they capture you, they will kill you and burn up the house.” I said: “Yes, I understand all this and know what risk I am running. But if you do as I suggest, I do not think any harm will come of it. I have come to stay but to-day, and will return to the army as soon as it is night again. Let me go upstairs to the room looking toward town. I am so tired that as soon as I strike the bed I will go to sleep, when you can lock the door; and if any of you want to see me, you can slip in during the day, and there is no reason that any one’s attention should be directed to the room if you are vigilant and discreet. Let no one know the fact that I am here but those of the immediate family, for I did not come for or expect to see any one else. As soon as it gets quiet after nightfall, I will come downstairs and, after telling you all good-by, will start back to the army.”