USA > Tennessee > Shelby County > Memphis > The Old Guard in Gray. Researches in the Annals of the Confederate Historical Association. Sketches of Memphis veterans who upheld her standards in the war, and of other Confederate worthies.. > Part 5
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Rumors of an approaching battle caused him to return to his command before his leave of absence expired, and he com- manded his battery in his usual effective way in the battle of Murfreesboro. (See " Campaigns and Battles of the Sixteenth Tennessee Volunteers," by Thomas A. Head, also Lindsley's " Military Annals of Tennessee.") After the retreat from Murfreesboro the battery was camped at Shelbyville and Tul- lahoma. Colonel Head, in his book, states that on the retreat to Chattanooga, July, 1863, when the army reached the Ten- nessee river, near the mouth of Battle creek, after hard rains, they found it much swollen and the pontoon bridge broken in the middle-half being on each side of the river. The en- gineer officers in charge were at a loss what to do. At the suggestion of General Cheatham, Captain Carnes was placed in charge, and by his knowledge of ropes, boats and water, acquired in the navy, he quickly replaced the broken bridge and the army passed over in safety. For this he was highly complimented by Generals Cheatham, Hardee, Walthall and others, who were anxious spectators of his work. The part that Carnes' Battery took at Chickamauga is a matter of his- tory. In the fight of Saturday afternoon, September 19, it
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P
suffered terribly in men and horses killed and wounded, and when the supporting infantry fell back the guns fell into the hands of the Federals. They were retaken, however, soon after, by Brown's and Bates' Brigades of Stewart's Division. Of seventy-eight men, thirty-eight were killed and wounded, and the battery also lost forty-nine horses in the short en- gagement of Saturday. The recaptured guns, with carriages badly used up, were carried to the rear, aeross Chickamauga creek, and, the battery being unfit for service, the remaining men were temporarily assigned to other commands, Captain Carnes being ordered to report for staff duty with General Leonidas Polk, who was very fond of him. General Bragg rode over the ground Sunday morning, and complimented Captain Carnes very highly for his work. After the battle he was given thirty days' leave of absence to fit out a new battery, having been allowed the privilege of making his selection from the fifty-nine guns taken from the field of Chickamauga, and on his return to the army he was placed in command of a battalion of four batteries. He continued in command of the battalion attached to the division com- manded by General C. L. Stevenson until early in 1864, when, at Dalton, he was ordered to report for duty in the navy. He had been appointed to the regular Confederate States Navy, along with other officers who resigned from the United States Navy at the beginning of the war, and while commanding his battery he was borne on the Confederate States Navy register as Lieutenant. but noted there as " furloughed without pay, serving with the army." Being ordered to Savannah. Ga., he became executive officer of the iron-clad "Savannah," and afterward commanded the steamer " Samson." In command of this latter vessel he was guarding the river above Savan- nah when that city fell into the enemy's hands, and he carried his boat up to Augusta on a very full river caused by heavy rains at that time; thence was ordered to Columbus, Ga., to assist in equipping an iron-clad there, and when that place fell he escaped and started to join Forrest ; met Grierson's raid at Eufaula, Ala., went back to Smithville, Ga., learned there that the army had surrendered, and then reported to
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Macon, Ga., to be paroled on May 10, 1865. It was a pleas- ant place to him. Captain Carnes returned to Memphis in June, 1865, and engaged in business here. In 1866 he mar- ried in Macon, Ga., and in the winter of 1867 he left Memphis to make his home in Macon. There he became actively con- nected with the local military. and was for many years cap- tain of the famous " Macon Volunteers," a crack company, whose organization dates back to 1825. In 1888 Captain Carnes returned to Memphis, bringing with him quite a large family reared in Georgia, and engaged in business here. In the course of time he became captain of " Company A, Con- federate Veterans," which he now commands. At the Au- gust election, 1896, as the Democratic nominee, he was elected Sheriff of Shelby county under the most complimentary cir- cumstances and conditions, and is now filling that office to the great satisfaction of all law-abiding and respectable ele- ments of the community, who feel that they have in him a fearless, faithful and efficient public servant. He is a quiet, modest man, a good disciplinarian, without being a martinet, and enjoying the fullest confidence and respect of all the people.
One of the memories of the war which Captain Carnes cher- ishes with commendable pride is the fact that General Forrest made special application for Carnes' assignment to his com- mand. In a communication addressed to Adjutant-General Cooper, at Richmond, General Forrest asked permission to leave the Army of Tennessee to come west and raise a com- mand for special purposes set forth. He desired only a force of four hundred men from his own command and a first-class battery of Dahlgren or Parrott guns, and he designated Cap- tain Carnes, then commanding a battery in Polk's Corps, as the artillery officer preferred by him. His suggestions were not then approved, but this did not lessen the compliment to Captain Carnes. This correspondence begins on page 507, Series 1, volume 30, of the " Official War Records," as pub- lished by the United States Government.
Another pleasing memento, now old and faded, is a let- ter from his former brigade commander, General Marcus J. 5
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CAPT. W. W. CARNES, In 1892.
Wright, written December 20, 1863, to Captain Carnes when he was about to leave the army in obedience to his orders for duty in the navy. Other highly prized letters from Generals Polk, Hardee and Cheatham were sent on to the Navy De- partment at Richmond, and were lost there.
One of his great friends and admirers was old Colonel Ola- dowski, General Bragg's Chief of Ordnance. From the battle of Perryville on through its career, Carnes' Battery used large quantities of canister shot at close quarters. This accorded so well with Colonel Oladowski's notions that he called Carnes his " canister shot captain " and was ready to sound his praises on all occasions.
In connection with this sketch we give two pictures of Captain Carnes. The first shows him as a young captain of artillery at the age of 21, the other as a citizen of Memphis thirty years later.
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CARTER, A. B., Captain Company F, Sixth Virginia Cav- alry, Army North Virginia; enlisted August, 1861, in the Black Horse Cavalry; was afterward elected first lieutenant Company F; was wounded five times-at Spottsylvania Court House, Winchester and in skirmishes in the Valley of Vir- ginia; was promoted to captaincy of Company F in 1863; lost an arm at Winchester October 9, 1864, and was unfitted by this and other wounds until the close of the war; paroled from hospital May. 1865; is a native of Virginia, but lived in Mississippi at the outbreak of the war, and has lived in Memphis nearly twenty years. Joined the C. H. A. in 1895.
CHEATHAM, MAJOR JOHN A., born June 6, 1826. in a home overlooking a part of the old graveyard now in- cluded in South Nashville. He was the fifth of eleven chil- dren. There were three sons, General Frank, Felix and John-the youngest. He was a son of Leonard P. Cheatham, who was postmaster at Nashville during President Polk's administration. His grandfather, Anderson Cheatham, with seven brothers were among the very early settlers in Robert- son county, coming from Virginia. His mother, Elizabeth R., was granddaughter of the leader of the pioneer settle- ment on the " Bluffs," or " French Lick," now Nashville, General James Robertson.
Most of his boyhood was spent on a farm. He was not fond of books-did not graduate. At the age of 20 he became a planter in Arkansas; returned to take a clerkship in the Nashville postoffice under his father, during the Polk admin- istration ; was chief clerk for two years; returned to Arkansas and became a merchant. Being slightly lame from an acci- dent in childhood. he did not enter the Confederate service until 1862 ; then joined a company of the Eighteenth Arkan- sas Regiment at Little Rock. He says now (1896) that he did nothing very brilliant, but that his promotions were numerous and in quick succession.
Reaching Fort Pillow he was made fourth sergeant ; next assigned to duty as adjutant. After the retreat from Corinth reported to General Cheatham and was made division ord-
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nance officer with the rank of major; was in the Kentucky campaign and at Chickamauga ; served as aide-de-camp on General Cheatham's staff' on down to the surrender in North Carolina. After the war lived in Middle Tennessee and Mis- sissippi ; married for the first time in 1876; came to Memphis- in 1882. Settled under his own vine and fig tree in a sub- urban village, joined the Confederate Historical Association, became a member of Company A, to which he still belongs, and is a fine type of the philosophie, entertaining Confed- erate veteran and old-time Southern gentleman.
CRUMP, JAMES M., Captain Company B, Seventeenth Mississippi Regiment; was wounded four times-in the two days' fight in front of Richmond, Va., at Gettysburg, Pa., and twice at Chickamauga. In application he says : " I served with one command from beginning to end, and the only regret I have now is that we did not succeed in our undertaking." Admitted to C. H. A. October 9, 1894.
CULBERSON, J. H., private Company C, Third South Carolina Cavalry ; enlisted March, 1864; was always in the same regiment. After the explosion of the mine at the crater in front of Petersburg, Va., the regiment was sent to South Carolina to meet Sherman's raid, and was surrendered at. Salisbury, N. C., April 17, 1865.
CUMMINS, HOLMES, was born 7th day of August, 1844, in Tipton county, Tenn. ; enlisted as a private in Company C, Ninth Tennessee Infantry, May 24, 1861; served in Cheat- ham's Division under Bragg, Johnston and Hood; he was wounded in the battles of Shiloh, Chickamauga, Resaca and Jonesboro; at close of the war was Adjutant of the Ninth Tennessee ; paroled May, 1865 ; afterward read law ; served two terms in the Legislature ; located in Memphis and became a very prominent lawyer, and died here October 24, 1896. His remains, in accordance with his instructions, were ere- mated in St. Louis and his ashes interred in the cemetery of his old home, Covington, Tennessee. He was one of the early members of this Association.
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GEN. JAMES R. CHALMERS.
CHALMERS, JAMES R., was born in Halifax county, Va., January 11, 1831 ; the oldest son of Hon. Jos. W. Chal- mers, who succeeded Robert J. Walker as United States Sen- ator from Mississippi. General Chalmers graduated with the second honors in the class of 1850 of the South Carolina Col- lege. Commenced the practice of law in Holly Springs, Miss., where he resided from childhood, in January, 1853. In 1857 he was elected district attorney of the Seventh Judicial Dis- triet of Mississippi. In 1860 was elected to the State Con- vention which declared the secession of Mississippi, and was chairman of the committee on military affairs in that body. When John Brown made his raid into Virginia General Chal- mers made a speech to the people at Hernando, declaring that it was time to prepare for war, and a company was then and there organized, of which he was elected captain, and
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this company he carried out on the first call for Confederate troops from Mississippi. In March. 1361, at Pensacola. Fla., he was elected colonel of the Ninth Mississippi Regiment. On the 12th of February, 1862, he was made a brigadier-gen- eral, and commanded the right brigade of Sidney Johnson's army at the battle of Shiloh, which got nearer to Pittsburg Landing than any other Confederate command in that engage- ment. He was wounded at the battle of Murfreesboro on Stone river, and after his recovery ordered to command of North Mississippi in 1863, where he commanded the cavalry until the arrival of General Forrest, when he took command of the First Division of Forrest's Cavalry, which position he held until the surrender.
He was elected to Congress in 1876, 1878, 1880 and 1882. HIe is a resident of Mississippi, but has his law office in Mem- phis, Tenn., in partnership with W. H. Carroll, who com- manded his escort company when he took command of North Mississippi.
CLEARY, JAMES. was born in Ireland January 22, 1844 : came to this country with his parents when an infant; was left an orphan in Memphis, without brothers or sisters, at the age of 8 years. At the beginning of the war he ran off to follow the Memphis boys at Columbus, Ky .; was rejected on account of youth, but on the 6th of April, 1861, he was sworn into Captain Marsh Patrick's Company HI, One Hundred and Fifty-fourth Tennessee Regiment. He was with the com- mand and in all engagements until after the battle of Mis- sionary Ridge, when he was furloughed indefinitely and sent to the hospital at Montgomery, Ala., on account of a serious scalp trouble which threatened his eyesight. From thence he passed through the lines and went to Hot Springs, where he remained some time and apparently recovered ; returned to the army. relapsed, went back to Hot Springs for a time, and was on his second return to the front when he heard of the surrender, and returned to what he called home.
Comrade Cleary had no blood kin in Memphis when he went into the army and none when he returned. A gallant fireman offered to secure him a job, and soon afterward he
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became a member of the fire department and distinguished himself for coolness and bravery. In time he became chief, and filled the place with distinction for many years. In 1884 he was taken from this position by the Board of Underwrit- ers and given the important position of inspector, and has filled it ever since. In all his life he has never had but four different employments, including his army service. This indi- cates his staying qualities, if he did run away once. He is quiet and modest, as he is courageous, and enjoys the implicit confidence of all who know him.
During the war an unele of whom he had never heard came to Memphis in a Federal regiment and inquired for him; he left his own address, away up in Massachusetts. After the war a pleasant correspondence ensued. The old uncle is alive yet, is some 80 odd years of age and draws a pension.
Captain Cleary, as he became before he was " chief," is not without some of his own blood and kin here now. He mar- ried after the war, and has an interesting family of nine chil- dren. He joined this Association soon after it came into existence and has been a regular attendant almost ever since, and has rendered much valuable service, especially on memo- rial or decoration occasions.
COLE, EDMUND ANDERSON, was born in Giles county, Tenn., on the 5th day of December, 1824. His mother was Mary Anderson, the daughter of Colonel Robert Anderson and Mary Read. His father was David R. Cole, and his grandmother on his father's side was a Miss Wills. They were all Virginians, but his grandfather Anderson and his father moved to Kentucky at an early period. His mother was of Scotch and his father of English descent. Both of his grandfathers fought in the Revolution.
He was licensed to practice law by Alexander M. Clayton of the High Court of Errors and Appeals the day he was 21 years old, but practiced only a short time, when he went to Mexico, being one of four brothers who enlisted in that war, one of whom fell a victim to disease and hardship incident to a soldier's life, and one other. now Dr. Robert A. Cole of Texas, was wounded. In 1849 he crossed the plains to Cali-
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fornia and engaged in mining. On his return home by way of Panama he was shipwrecked and returned with five com- panions through Mexico and Texas to Holly Springs, Miss., where he became in a business way connected with the North- ern Bank of Mississippi. Afterward he became engaged in planting on the Mississippi river and moved to Memphis in 1857. In March, 1862, was elected and served as Captain of Maynard Rifles (Company L) in the One Hundred and Fifty- fourth Sr. Regiment. Tennessee Volunteers, and took part in the battles of Shiloh, Richmond, Ky., and Perryville. A complimentary notice of him and his company can be found in the tenth volume of the Government War Records. After the battle of Murfreesboro and the army had fallen back to Chat- tanooga, he was a member of one of General Bragg's court- martials, with the gallant General Carter as president, until his health became so impaired that he was unable to act. He, according to the opinion of army surgeons, was in so danger- ous a condition as to be liable to drop dead at any moment, having rheumatism of the heart, and was advised to resign, but refused for several months to do so. Finally, despairing of ever getting well, he tendered his resignation, which was accepted. He remained in Mississippi, however, until the surrender and then returned to his home in Memphis, where he found that he had been complimented with an indictment for treason. He is at present secretary of the Memphis Bar and Law Library Association, and is of himself a walking encyclopedia of war reminiscences and varied thrilling expe- riences in the far West and South. He was one of the earliest members of the old Confederate Relief and Historical Asso- ciation, but delicate health has prevented him from taking an active part.
CROFFORD, J. A., was a private in Company D, McDon- ald's Battalion, Forrest's old regiment; enlisted July, 1863, in Mississippi, but did not reach his regiment until Septem- ber following ; was wounded once in a battle south of and near Columbia, Tenn. His parole and other papers were burned in his home.
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THOS. H. CHILTON, In 1861.
CHILTON, THOS. H., was born in Benton, now Calhoun county, Ala., and removed to Mississippi when a child with his father and grew up at Byhalia and Oxford. Enlisted in the Lamar Rifles under Captain Green early in 1861. The company was afterward Company G, Eleventh Mississippi Regiment. It went into Virginia in the spring, but as young Chilton had been elected speaker for his (sophomore) class in the University of Mississippi he was induced to remain over for the commencement exercises, which never came off. The war spirit was so high that the university was suspended and he soon joined his company at Bristow's Station, near Man- assas Plains, and was there sworn into the Confederate ser- vice July 7, 1861, at the age of 18 years. His first entlistment was for twelve months. At the end of that time he re-en- listed for the war and on that account was given a thirty days' furlough.
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He served in Generals Bee's, Whiting's, Law's and Davis' Brigades, and in Joseph E. Johnston's, Stonewall Jackson's, Longstreet's, Hood's and A. P. Hill's Corps ; was wounded at the battle of Seven Pines ; wound not serious enough to cause him to leave his company. The division in which he served was transferred to Stonewall Jackson's command in the Val- ley of Virginia and made the famous march in the valley and over Blue Ridge to the rear of MeClellan's army, and was again wounded in the battle of Gains' Mill on Frazer's farm ; still kept on with the command and participated in the battle of Malvern Hill. The next battle he was in was the second battle of Manassas, in which he took part two days. He was under General Lee in his first and second invasions of Mary- land and Pennsylvania.
On the first advance across the Potomac, when the army reached Hagerstown, Md., the quartermasters bought up all the shoes in the place. Only two pairs could be issued to his company. An inspection was made and he was selected as one of the two men suffering most for shoes and was given a light pair of gaiters. too large for his bleeding feet ; went on and was in the battle of Boonsboro and South Mountain. He was wounded a few days afterward at Sharpsburg, where twelve bullets passed through his clothes ; there he was given a sixty days' wounded furlough.
An incident at Sharpsburg illustrates the dire extremities to which the young men of the South were often reduced in the field. After the first day's fight he was detailed with others to go out at night in search of food for the company. They found only green corn and raw Irish potatoes in a field between the lines, and the men gladly ate these rations with- out cooking them. Next day in the fight in the same field young Chilton fell wounded and had only two raw potatoes in his haversack. Such were some of the privations and suf- ferings of Southern soldiers who had been accustomed at home to all the comforts and luxuries that easy circumstances or wealth command. On the second advance into Pennsyl- vania he was at the battle of Gettysburg and was in nearly all the general and minor engagements in which the army of Northern Virginia participated for four years.
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THOS. H. CHILTON, In 1896.
Finally he was captured in the last fight at Petersburg down on the extreme right at daylight April 2, 1865. Before that he had been detailed as commissary of the regiment and properly could have kept out of the battle, but hearing that one was coming on got a gun and fifty rounds of ammunition and went into it. After this he endured eleven weeks' harsh imprisonment at Fort Delaware and was released June 11, 1865. Box car transportation was furnished him to Cairo; he came down the river in a boat to Memphis and slept the first night, June 27th, on the ground at the Memphis & Charleston depot. Next morning, hungry and half fainting, he met an old negro named Newt Chilton, a former slave of his father, who was overjoyed to meet his " young master," as he still addressed him, and took him to a restaurant where he was employed and ordered the best in the house and gave
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the famished young soldier the first full meal he had touched in many months.
He walked to Oxford through the country; returned to Memphis the same summer; became employed in a leading drug house on Main street ; was admitted as a member of the firm six years later and has been so connected and actively engaged ever since. He has other interests, and for several years past has been president of one of the largest financial institutions of the city. Has been a member of the Confeder- ate Relief and Historical Association and its successor since the first organization, and is a member of the Central Method- ist Church ; was married to Miss Blanche M. Blair of this city December 13, 1871, and they have two living children, a son and daughter.
COLLIER, DABNEY W., born in Haywood county, Tenn., February 20, 1841, and came from Revolutionary ancestry on all sides. He left the sophomore class at school to join the Bluff City Grays under Captain James H. Edmondson. The com- pany was splendidly armed and equipped. The officers were : James HI. Edmondson, Captain ; Chris Sherwin, First Lieu- tenant; John R. J. Creighton, Second Lieutenant ; Phil. T. Allin, Brevet Second Lieutenant ; Thomas F. Patterson, First Sergeant ; John Il. Mitchell, Second Sergeant ; L. A. Spicer, Third Sergeant ; M. R. Marshall, Fourth Sergeant; W. J. P. Doyle, First Corporal ; R. H. Flournoy, Second Corporal ; James McClain, Third Corporal ; R. J. Eyrich, Fourth Cor- poral. In April, 1861, the company fully equipped filed into Court Square to receive a beautiful flag presented with a patriotic and eloquent address by Mrs. Judge Dixon, after which the boys marched away under a shower of bouquets and adieus.
Chris Sherwin the First Lieutenant, was a finely drilled soldier, an ex-member of Ellsworth's famous Zouaves, and possessed that peculiar faculty and magnetism to impart his instruction to others.
D. W. Collier entered active service with his company, which was placed with the One Hundred and Fifty-fourth, as Company B, May 5, 1861, at Randolph, and took part in the
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battle of Belmont ; was on outpost duty with Preston Smith's Brigade at Purdy, Tennessee, and participated in the battle of Shiloh. At the end of twelve months the company reorgan- ized as sharpshooters for General Preston Smith's Brigade and moved with the brigade to Chattanooga. The brigade was here detached and with Cleburne's Brigade formed a division, commanded by Brigadier-General Cleburne, and was engaged in the battle of Richmond, Ky., August 31, 1862, and was with the command which threatened Covington, Ky .; rejoined the Army of Tennessee at Harrodsburg, Ky., returning to former division (Cheatham's) in time to take part in the battle of Perryville ; was in the battle of Murfrees- boro December 31, 1862, and January 1 and 4, 1863, in which Lieutenants John Creighton and Albert Bunch were killed, after which W. J. P. Doyle and Dabney W. Collier were elected to fill the two vacancies, at Shelbyville. The com- pany was mounted and transferred to the cavalry service January 15, 1863, and placed in the Eleventh Tennessee, com- manded by Colonel James H. Edmondson.
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