That was the last day of the retreat. Price took a stand at Cross Hollow where Van Dorn joined him. The Union army stopped at Pea Ridge. Both armies rested three days. On the night of the third day Price broke camp and traveled all night. By daylight he was in the road behind the enemy, and at sun up moved south toward their camp. We had not gone far when we met fifteen or twenty government teams going on a forage. They were greatly surprised, but grinned and said nothing. Price put a guard over them and moved on. When he got in position on the rear he fired a cannon as a signal to Van Dorn that all was ready. The engagement soon opened front and rear. Price was successful on his side, but Van Dorn was defeated. In less than an hour not a gun could be heard along the whole south side of the army. The whole force then turned upon Price and he was compelled to retreat. He went north until he came to a road leading across the mountains to White River. The Union forces did not follow and the retreat was made with little difficulty. We had no baggage except the artillery and the teams captured early in the morning. The roads, however, were very rough and our progress was very slow. On the following morning while we were toiling over the mountains, General Price rode by with his arm in a sling. The boys cheered him until the mountains resounded for miles. In a few days we were beyond danger of pursuit and made our way in safety to Fort Smith.
From Fort Smith Price was ordered to Memphis. He started at once over land to Des Arc on White River. From there we went to Memphis by boat. After a short stay in Memphis, Brother James, who had returned from California and joined the army, was sent back to Missouri as a recruiting officer. Billy Bridgeman and I got leave to accompany him and we all came together back as far as Des Arc. There Billy decided to return to Memphis and go on with Price, while Brother James and I came home on horse back. This is the last time I ever saw Bridgeman.
[CHAPTER XIII.]
Home for Recruits.
I do not recall the incidents of the trip home. I do not remember the road or how we crossed the river or anything about it, though I have tried very hard to recall them. I only know that we went from Des Arc to Dover, Arkansas, and that somewhere on the road Henry Gibson and Harold Shultz joined us and that we all reached home together. Henry Gibson is dead. Schultz is insane and confined at State Hospital No. 2 at St. Joseph, and Brother James is in Idaho, so I have no way of refreshing my memory, and as the trip, although it covered nearly four hundred miles, was made forty-eight years ago, my foot steps have grown cold. It is more than probable that a single hint would rescue the entire journey and its incidents.
I recall events after we reached home with perfect distinctness. We remained out in the brush most of the time. Brother James, at such times as he could, met all those who wanted to join the army. Besides the boys on the east side of Platte River, he enlisted John and Wash Lynch, two of the Greenwood boys, Jack Smedley, Jim Reeves, William and John Reynolds and Richard Miller from the west side. In all there were some twenty-five or thirty. We secured a tent and pitched it in a secret place in what was then and now sometimes called "the hackle," about a mile east of Garrettsburg. We had scant provisions, some flour, sugar, coffee and bacon which we kept hanging in a tree. During the day we managed to partly satisfy our hunger on this diet, but at night we went out to see the girls and get good meals. In spite of the constant fear of discovery, we had a good time. During all this time the boys were collecting guns and ammunition. These they got wherever they could. Most often from friends who gave or loaned them, but sometimes from a straggling soldier or militia man who was caught away from camp.
Everything was ready and the night fixed for our departure. Doc Watson had informed us that there was a company of militia camped in his yard about three miles distant from our camp, cooking, eating and sleeping on his blue grass. Our plan was to march up near them during the night and wake them at daybreak and bid them goodby. During the entire time our camp remained there, we took no pains to conceal it from the negroes, for the most of them—and we thought all—could be trusted as far as our white friends. We made a mistake in one of them. He turned traitor and told the company at Doc Watson's that about two hundred "bush-whackers" were camped in the Hackle. They informed the authorities at St. Joe and the night before we proposed to execute our plans they marched two regiments—one infantry and one cavalry—down close to our camp and next morning surprised us by calling about sun up. It was clear they had a guide for they followed the trail through the thick woods directly to the tent.
The tent was stretched in a little valley and over beyond a deep gulch, so that it was impossible to approach nearer than fifty yards of it on horseback. This was too close to be comfortable to the eight men who were in it sound asleep. Without a moment's warning they fired into it. The aim was high and not a man was hit. They jumped and ran for their lives and all escaped. It was our good fortune that more of the boys were not in the tent. As it was to be the last night at home, most of the boys had gone to bid their friends goodby and had remained with them for the night. Brother James and I had gone home with Charley Pullins, who had joined our company, and, in place of returning to the tent, we all took our blankets and slept in his rye field.
Early next morning we were awakened by the barking of Pullins' dog. We jumped up and looked and listened. A regiment of infantry was passing along the road. They had a six gun battery with them and I could not mistake the creaking of the old truck-wheels. We picked up our blankets and ran to the house and threw them in at the back window, and then stepped around in front to watch them go by, some two hundred yards distant. We had no idea they were after us with all this equipment, but supposed they were simply marching from Easton to St. Joe and had probably missed the road. We knew nothing of the attack upon the tent, nor did we know that at that moment the cavalry regiment had divided into squads and was galloping from house to house all over the neighborhood, looking for the Gibson boys.