If I have wit enough to get out of this wood, I have enough
to serve mine own turn.--MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM.
[Sidenote: DAN ELLIS, THE UNION GUIDE.]
For many months before leaving prison, we had been familiar with the
name of DAN ELLIS--a famous Union guide, who, since the beginning of
the war, had done nothing but conduct loyal men to our lines.
Ellis is a hero, and his life a romance. He had taken through, in
all, more than four thousand persons. He had probably seen more
adventure--in fights and races with the Rebels, in long journeys,
sometimes bare-footed and through the snow, or swimming rivers full of
floating ice--than any other person living.
He never lost but one man, who was swooped up through his own
heedlessness. The party had traveled eight or ten days, living
upon nothing but parched corn. Dan insisted that a man could walk
twenty-five miles a day through snow upon parched corn just as well as
upon any other diet--if he only thought so. I feel bound to say that I
have tried it and do not think so. This person held the same opinion.
He revolted against the parched-corn diet, vowing that he would go to
the first house and get an honest meal, if he was captured for it. He
went to the first house, obtained the meal, and was captured.
After we had traveled fifty miles, everybody said to us, "If you can
only find Dan Ellis, and do just as he tells you, you will be certain
to get through."
[Sidenote: IN GOOD HANDS AT LAST.]
We _did_ find Dan Ellis. On this Sunday night, one hundred and
thirty-four miles from our lines, greatly broken down, we reached a
point on the road, waited for two hours, when along came Dan Ellis,
with a party of seventy men--refugees, Rebel deserters, Union soldiers
returning from their homes within the enemy's lines, and escaping
prisoners. About thirty of them were mounted and twenty armed.
Like most men of action, Dan was a man of few words. When our story had
been told him, he said to his comrades:
"Boys, here are some gentlemen who have escaped from Salisbury, and are
almost dead from the journey. They are our people. They have suffered
in our Cause. They are going to their homes in our lines. We can't ride
and let these men walk. Get down off your horses, and help them up."
Down they came, and up we went; and then we pressed along at a terrible
pace.
In low conversation, as we rode through the darkness, I learned from
Dan and his companions something of his strange, eventful history. At
the outbreak of the war, he was a mechanic in East Tennessee. After
once going through the mountains to the Union lines, he displayed rare
capacity for woodcraft, and such vigilance, energy, and wisdom, that he
fell naturally into the pursuit of a pilot.
Six or eight of his men, who had been with him from the beginning, were
almost equally familiar with the routes. They lived near him, in Carter
County, Tennessee, in open defiance of the Rebels. When at home, they
usually slept in the woods, and never parted from their arms for a
single moment.
As the Rebels would show them no mercy, they could not afford to be
captured. For three years there had been a standing offer of five
thousand dollars for Dan Ellis's head. During that period, except when
within our lines, he had never permitted his Henry rifle, which would
fire sixteen times without reloading, to go beyond the reach of his
hand.
[Illustration: DAN. ELLIS.]
[Sidenote: An Unequal Battle--Ellis's Bravery.]
Once, when none of his comrades, except Lieutenant Treadaway, were
with him, fourteen of the Rebels came suddenly upon them. Ellis and
Treadaway dropped behind logs and began to fire their rifles. As the
enemy pressed them, they fell slowly back into a forest, continuing
to shoot from behind trees. The unequal skirmish lasted three hours.
Several Rebels were wounded, and at last they retreated, leaving the
two determined Unionists unharmed and masters of the field.
Dan usually made the trip to our lines once in three or four weeks,
leading through from forty to five hundred persons. Before starting, he
and his comrades would make a raid upon the Rebels in some neighboring
county, take from them all the good horses they could find, and, after
reaching Knoxville, sell them to the United States quartermaster.
Thus they obtained a livelihood, though nothing more. The refugees and
escaping prisoners were usually penniless, and Ellis, whose sympathies
flowed toward all loyal men like water, was compelled to feed them
during the entire journey. He always remunerated Union citizens for
provisions purchased from them.
To-night was so cold, that our sore, lame joints would hardly support
us upon our horses. Dan's rapid marching was the chief secret of his
success. He seemed determined to keep at least one day ahead of all
Rebel pursuers.
Now that we were safe in his hands, I accompanied the party
mechanically, with no further questions or anxiety about routes; but I
chanced to hear Treadaway ask him:
"Don't you suppose the Nolechucky is too high for us to ford?"
"Very likely," replied Dan; "we will stop and inquire of Barnet."
Upon the mule which I rode, a sack of corn served for a saddle. I was
not accomplished in the peculiar gymnastics required to sit easily upon
it and keep it in place.
[Sidenote: LOST!--A PERILOUS BLUNDER.]
Thirsty and feverish, I stopped at the crossing of Rock Creek for a
draught of water and to adjust the corn-sack. Attempting to remount, I
was as stiff and awkward as an octogenarian, and my restive mule would
not stand for a moment. I finally succeeded in climbing upon his back
two or three minutes after the last horseman disappeared up the bank.
We had been traveling across forests, over hills, through swamps,
without regard to thoroughfares; but I rode carelessly on, supposing
that my mule's instinct would keep him on the fresh scent of the
cavalcade. When we had jogged along for ten minutes, awakening from a
little reverie, I listened vainly to hear the footfalls of the horses.
All was silent. I dismounted, and examined the half-frozen road, but no
hoof-marks could be seen upon it.
I was lost! It might mean recapture--it might mean reimprisonment and
death, for the terms were nearly synonymous. I was ignorant about the
roads, and whether I was in a Union or Rebel settlement.
To search for that noiseless, stealthy party would be useless; so I
rode back to the creek, tied my mule to a laurel in the dense thicket,
and sat down upon a log, pondering on my stupid heedlessness, which
seemed likely to meet its just reward. I remembered that Davis owed his
original capture to a mule, and wondered if the same cause was about to
produce for me a like result.
Mentally anathematizing my long-eared brute, I gave him a part of the
corn, and threw myself down behind a log, directly beside the road.
This would enable me to hear the horse's feet of any one who might
return for me. In a few minutes I was sound asleep.
When awakened by the cold, my watch told me that it was three o'clock.
Running to and fro in the thicket until my blood was warmed, I resumed
my position behind the log, and slept until daylight was gleaming
through the forest.
[Sidenote: A MOST FORTUNATE ENCOUNTER.]
Walking back to the creek, I reconnoitered a log dwelling, so small and
humble that its occupant was probably loyal. In a few minutes, through
the early dawn, an old man, with a sack of corn upon his shoulder,
came out of the house. He evinced no surprise at seeing me. Looking
earnestly into his eyes, I asked him:
"Are you a Union man or a Secessionist?" He replied:
"I don't know who you are; but I am a Union man, and always have been."
"I am a stranger and in trouble. I charge you to tell me the truth."
"I do tell you the truth, and I have two sons in the United States
army."
His manner appeared sincere, and he carried a letter of recommendation
in his open, honest face. I told him my awkward predicament. He
reassured me at once.
"I know Dan Ellis as well as my own brother. No truer man ever lived.
What route was he going to take?"
"I heard him say something about Barnet's."
"That is a ford only five miles from here. Barnet is one of the right
sort of people. This road will take you to his house. Good-by, my
friend, and don't get separated from your party again."
[Sidenote: REJOINING DAN AND HIS PARTY.]
I certainly did not need the last injunction. Reaching the ford, Barnet
told me that our party had spent several hours in crossing, and was
encamped three miles ahead. He took me over the river in his canoe,
my mule swimming behind. Half a mile down the road. I met Ellis and
Treadaway.
"Ah ha!" said Dan, "we were looking for you. I told the boys not to be
uneasy. There are men in our crowd who would have blundered upon some
Rebel, told all about us, and so alarmed the country and brought out
the Home Guards; but I knew you were discreet enough to take care of
yourself, and not endanger us. Let us breakfast at this Union house."
XXIII. _Monday, January 9._
"To-day," said Dan Ellis, "we must cross the Big Butte of Rich
Mountain."
"How far is it?" I asked.
"It is generally called ten miles; but I suspect it is about fifteen,
and a rather hard road at that."
About fifteen, and a rather hard road! It seemed fifty, and a very _Via
Dolorosa_.
We started at 11 A.M. For three miles we followed a winding creek, the
horsemen on a slow trot, crossing the stream a dozen times; the footmen
keeping up as best they could, and shivering from their frequent baths
in the icy waters.
[Sidenote: A TERRIBLE MOUNTAIN MARCH.]
We turned up the sharp side of a snowy mountain. For hours and hours
we toiled along, up one rocky, pine-covered hill, down a little
declivity, then up another hill, then down again, but constantly
gaining in hight. The snow was ten inches deep. Dan averred he had
never crossed the mountain when the travel was so hard; but he pushed
on, as if death were behind and heaven before.
The rarity of the air at that elevation increased my pneumonic
difficulty, and rendered my breath very short. Ellis furnished me with
a horse the greater part of the way; but the hills, too steep for
riding, compelled us to climb, our poor animals following behind. The
pithy proverb, that "it is easy to walk when one leads a horse by the
bridle," was hardly true in my case, for it seemed a hundred times
to-day as if I could not possibly take another step, but must fall out
by the roadside, and let the company go on. But after my impressive
lesson of last night, I was hardly likely to halt so long as any
locomotive power remained.
Our men and animals, in single file, extended for more than a mile in a
weary, tortuous procession, which dragged its slow length along. After
hours which appeared interminable, and efforts which seemed impossible,
we halted upon a high ridge, brushed the snow from the rocks, and
sat down to a cold lunch, beside a clear, bright spring which gushed
vigorously from the ground. I ventured to ask:
"Are we near the top?"
"About half way up," was Dan's discouraging reply.
"Come, come, boys; we must pull out!" urged Davis; and, following that
irrepressible invalid, we moved forward again.
As we climbed hill after hill, thinking we had nearly reached the
summit, beyond us would still rise another mountain a little higher
than the one we stood upon. They seemed to stretch out to the crack of
doom.
[Sidenote: A STORM INCREASES THE DISCOMFORTS.]
To increase the discomfort, a violent rain came on. The very memory
of this day is wearisome. I pause, thankful to end only a chapter, in
the midst of an experience which, judged by my own feelings, appeared
likely to end life itself.