Reaching Mr. Harrison's house I found the family anxious and excited. Mr. H., to avoid capture, had concealed himself in the garden. I expressed my regrets to Mrs. H. that I was unable to keep my engagement, as I had another, which was a little more pressing. She insisted that I remain with them until the hour for leaving and I sat down to meditate on the fate that the future had in store for me. When a boy I had often sung the old hymn containing the words:
"Sweet prospects, sweet birds and sweet flowers," but the prospect that loomed up before me that summer afternoon had no flavor of sugar or honey and, as I now recall it, not even a trace of sorghum molasses to shade its bitterness. As I sat there on the piazza, a Federal brigade passed in a short distance of the house followed by a crowd of contrabands. One of the soldiers came in and took a ham from the pantry without taking the trouble to ask for it. Others passed through the yard on other errands. Nothing was said to me and I made no special effort to attract their attention. I was saying nothing, but I was doing some pretty tall thinking. The idea had occurred to me, either, as Judge Longstreet has said, by "internal suggestion or the bias of jurisprudence," that if I remained quietly where I was, I might be overlooked and I decided to make the experiment. At 5 p. m. the squad of convalescents was re-formed and marched off under guard, passing within a short distance of where I sat. Possibly I felt that my place was properly among them, but I felt no disposition to halt them in order to secure it and my heart grew lighter as the line grew dim in the distance and finally vanished. I have sometimes been accused of being absent-minded, but on that occasion I had reason to be grateful for being absent-bodied.
At nightfall I returned to my hospital cot and slept the sleep of the just. I was in no hurry to rise next morning until at 9 a. m., some one came in and reported that all the raiders had shaken the dust of Oxford from their feet. My escape was due to "Macaria" and for that reason I have always felt kindly towards the book and its author. In my condition a Northern prison would have meant for me slow death and an unmarked grave and these records would have been unwritten or penned by other hands.
A SLAVES LOYALTY.
On the same day Col. H. D. Capers of the 12th Ga. Battalion, was in Oxford recuperating from a wound received in Virginia. Being advised of the approach of Garrard's division, he leaped through a rear window of his residence and taking a country road proceeded to change his base at double-quick step. Learning of his escape a squad of cavalry started in pursuit and on reaching a fork in the road they asked a negro standing by which route Col. Capers had taken. The slave, faithful to his master's friend, intentionally misinformed them and before the error was discovered the colonel was safely hidden.
This act of faithfulness recalls the unswerving loyalty of the race during the horrors of a four years' struggle, whose issue meant their freedom. Suggesting as it does the ties of friendship between master and servant in the old slave days, it furnishes a reason for the kindly interest the South still feels in the remnant of a class that is fading from the earth and may account for the further fact that on this institution, despite its faults, there rested for a hundred years Heaven's benediction and the smile of God.
ONE AGAINST THREE THOUSAND.
Rumors of the raid had been current for several days before its occurrence, and a Mr. Jones, a citizen of Covington, Ga., whose hatred of everything blue had been inflamed by reports of outrages committed by Sherman's army, pledged himself to kill the first Federal soldier who approached his home. Learning that Garrard's division had reached the town, he loaded his squirrel rifle and taking his stand in front of the court house he awaited his opportunity. He had been on post but a little while when a Federal cavalryman approached with a squad of convalescents captured at the hospital. Jones allowed him to come within close range and then raised his rifle. The Yankee shouted to him: "Don't shoot," but his purpose was not to be changed and his victim dropped from the saddle. Reloading his rifle and changing his position to another street a second squad of prisoners came by and again his rifle brought down its game. Reloading the third time he intercepted a platoon of cavalry and fired into it, wounding two of them. They captured him, shot him to death and then beat out his brains with the butts of their rifles. He doubtless anticipated such a fate and went coolly to certain death with no hope of fame and with only the satisfaction of getting two for one.
Geo. Daniel, a Confederate quartermaster, chanced to be at home on furlough in Covington on the same day. He had been out bird hunting that morning and on his return was captured by the Yankees, who enraged by the killing of two of their men by Jones, determined to shoot Daniel simply because he was found with a gun in his hand. His protest that he was out for no hostile purpose availed him nothing. He was ordered to face his executioners and an effort was made to bind a handkerchief over his eyes. He drew it away and said, "No, a Confederate soldier can face death without being blindfolded." The rifles rang out and he fell, another victim to the humane influence of Northern civilization.