From Bull Run to Appomattox: A Boy's View

by Luther W. Hopkins

ONE OF STONEWALL JACKSON'S MILEPOSTS. A FAMILIAR SIGHT TO THOSE WHO TRAVELED THE VALLEY TURNPIKE DURING THE CIVIL WAR.

But to go back. As I have said, I was on the march from home toward the army, and had reached a point not far from Charlottesville. There were about a dozen of us, all belonging to my regiment. About noon we saw advancing toward us a small body of cavalry. At first we took them for the enemy and approached them cautiously, they using the same precaution. When we discovered that we were fellow-Confeds we passed with a salute. One of them called to us and said, "Boys, you may as well go home; Lee has surrendered his army." We paid no attention to it, but moved on. A mile farther we met another squad and asked what was the news from the army. We got this reply: "As we passed through Charlottesville we came near being mobbed for telling the news from the army. You had better go on and find out for yourselves." Soon after this we met a colonel leading about 40 cavalrymen. By this time we began to feel that something was wrong. The colonel halted his men and frankly told us that it was a fact that Lee had surrendered his army. He stated that some of the cavalry had escaped and they were making their way toward their homes, and advised us to do the same. The colonel and his men moved on, and we halted for an hour in the road discussing the situation and trying to determine what to do. We were not prepared to act upon the evidence that we had had regarding the surrender, but were willing to admit that it might be true. One fellow from Company F, riding a gray horse, rose in his stirrups, and lifting his clinched hand high above his head, said, "If Gen. Lee has had to surrender his army, there is not a just God in Heaven."

Finally we decided to cross the mountains into the Virginia Valley and tarry in the vicinity of Staunton and await further tidings. I made a bee-line for my brother Gerard's. The others scattered here and there. After remaining a few days at my brother's I started, in company with six or eight others, who were from the lower end of the valley, principally Clark county, for my home in Loudoun, with no definite idea as to what I should do before I got there. In fact, the others were in the same frame of mind.

We had heard and read the proclamation that all Confederate soldiers who would surrender their arms and take the oath of allegiance to the U.S. Government (except a certain grade of officers) would be allowed to go to their homes and not be molested, but we had not yet come to the point of surrendering.

We moved on down the valley pike, noting as we went the terrible havoc the war had made, commenting on what we called Jackson's mileposts, viz. the skeletons of horses that had fallen by the way. They were, however, too thick to be called mileposts, but that is what we called them.

A little below Woodstock, I think it was, we saw on a hill, standing in the middle of the road facing us, two sentinels on horseback. They were Yankee pickets. I think there were eight of us. We halted. Someone said, "Well, boys, what are we going to do? We can't pass these pickets. Shall we surrender?" I guess we stood there for an hour. We were all mounted. Finally a young fellow from Clark county said, "I'm going up and surrender." Another said, "I go with you." And the two, taking something in their hands that would pass for a flag of truce (white handkerchiefs had become obsolete), went forward and were allowed to pass. They went to headquarters and surrendered. Then one by one the little band melted away, leaving two, and I was one of them. We were not ready to surrender. We went back out of sight, and made a flank movement to get into the foothills of the Massanutten mountains, and by keeping under cover of the timber, managed to get within 12 miles of my home without being molested.

As we stood on the edge of the woods we saw the Yankee cavalry moving up and down the turnpike running from Paris to Middleburg. It looked as if there was nothing else to do but surrender. At this point my comrade deserted me and went forward and surrendered. I watched my opportunity, slipping across the pike unobserved, and following the Blue Ridge mountains until nearly opposite my home, took a straight line across the fields and reached home safely. As I carried my full complement of arms I created no little surprise and consternation.

Union soldiers were constantly passing along the road which ran close by my home, some of them stopping for water or for information, but I could not fully make up my mind to surrender. My brother Richard of Mosby's command was of the same mind. Mosby and all his men had surrendered, and the family pleaded with us to do the same, but we were obstinate. This, however, was nothing to our credit. When one is whipped he should be man enough to acknowledge it and brave enough to surrender, unless the conqueror be a cannibal.