The Reconstruction Period
PREFACE
For the unpleasant facts recorded in this, I am not responsible, but only the powers that were then. I would much prefer to forget as I have forgiven, and not reopen old wounds, but a sacred duty I owe my family forces me to submit the unvarnished truth and use expressions, though harsh, to properly represent conditions as they existed, to protect my lifetime fair name and character, which I must leave my family untarnished, and also to redeem my promise to them and my many interested friends, who were personally acquainted with me during the years of this terrible experience.
Do not fail to bear in mind that this is written altogether from memory, nearly fifty years after it occurred, hence dates are omitted.
In order to give the reader a full appreciation of my remarkable preservation and escape from being murdered by the powers that ruled at the time, I treat the subject as I do. Drifting into this trouble was certainly not of my own choice, but altogether owing to conditions and surroundings. I was simply the instrument in God’s hands to relieve a law abiding and submissive community of a terrible calamity about to be enacted by a lawless band of marauders in the uniform of the United States, protected by their officers and permitted by the, then, General Government, and my life was spared by the interposition of a Divine Providence. It was this firm conviction that gave me strength and hope that all would be well and enabled me to pass through this terrible ordeal.
There was no law to protect or appeal to, only the whim of a vindictive military satrap, whose order was supreme and who regarded the best citizens of the country fit subjects for his vengeance and persecution.
Our State Government, organized under the terms of our surrender, composed of the best and most solid element of the State, working in conjunction with the returned Confederate soldiers to rehabilitate our ruined homes, was ruthlessly set aside by the infamous order of General Sheridan, as an impediment to reconstruction.
To longer submit to such conditions and subject our families to dangers worse than death, made men desperate and called forth every spark of manhood in man, particularly in one who had followed Sherman’s march through Georgia and the Carolinas and made him liable to resent outrages when brought directly to his own home in the most effective way, regardless of consequences.
As a result of our action, having removed the bandit leader from among them, our community was no longer subjected to their deviltry. They were completely overawed and behaved themselves forever after, thereby avoiding much bloodshed. Had they burned Hempstead that night, which no doubt they would have done, an outraged citizenship would have gathered and visited vengeance on these devils incarnate and no promise of General Sheridan, as in the case of Brenham, could have stayed them, then what would have been the result?
I had the sympathy of the best citizens of the country, offers of men and money, which were always declined in the interest of peace.