I very much opposed and tried to put a stop to the robbery, thieving and horse stealing that was so prominent after the war, and advised the boys that got into trouble to leave the country time and time again, and go to Old Mexico while it was yet time to get away.
I returned home with no money and no means at all, but found plenty of friends who were ready to help me and who furnished me money to start with.
I advise all who read this book to appreciate character above money.
Death of Quantrell
Quantrell, with forty-eight of the most daring of his old band, accompanied Shepherd as far south as White River, Arkansas. He left them there to go to his old home in Maryland. He passed all Federal camps, had no trouble staying in Federal camps, eating with Federal soldiers, playing Federal himself until he reached Upton Station, in Hart County, Kentucky, where he crossed the Louisiana & Nashville Railroad, still representing himself and his men as Federal soldiers.
Near Marion County he entered the Lebanon and Campbellville turnpike at Rolling Fork and traveled north to New Market, thence east to Bradford, and from Bradford towards Hustonville, camping for the night preceding the entrance into this place at Major Dray’s, on Rolling Fork. Thirty Federal soldiers were at garrison at Hustonville, possessed of as many horses in splendid condition, and these Quantrell determined to appropriate. No opposition was made to his entrance into the town. No one imagined him to be other than a Union officer on a scout.
He dismounted quietly at a hotel in the place and entered at once into a pleasant conversation with the commander of the post. Authorized by their chieftain, however, to remount themselves as speedily as possible and as thoroughly as possible, the Guerrillas spread quickly over the town in search for horses, appropriating first what could be found in the public stables and later on those that were still needed to supply the deficiency, from private places.
As Quantrell conversed with the commander, a Federal private made haste to inform him of the kind of work the newcomers were doing, and to complain loudly of the unwarranted and outrageous appropriation.
Enraged and excited, the commander snatched up a brace of revolvers as he left his headquarters and buckled them about him and hurried to the nearest livery stable where the best among the animals of his men had been kept. Just as he arrived, Allen Parmer was riding out mounted on a splendid horse. The Federal major laid hands upon the bridle and bade Parmer dismount. It was as the grappling of a wave with a rock.