THE PASSING OF THE RUBICON.
Who can tell the thoughts of John H. Morgan, as he sat on his horse that
July day, and with fixed gaze looked out upon the river. Beyond lay the
fair fields of Indiana, the Canaan of his hopes. Should he go in and
possess? The waters needed not to be rolled back. He had the means of
crossing. Before him all was calm, peaceful. No foe stood on the opposite
bank to oppose him; no cannon frowned from the hilltops. Behind him were
thousands of angry Federals in swift pursuit. Would it be safer to go
ahead than to turn back?
As Cæsar stood on the bank of the Rubicon debating what to do, so did
Morgan stand on the bank of the Ohio. Like Cæsar, if he once took the
step, he must abide the consequences. But if there was any hesitation in
the mind of Morgan, he did not hesitate long. “Cross over,” was the order
which he gave. “We shall soon know,” he said to Calhoun, “whether they are
friends or foes over there; whether the forty thousand Knights who were so
anxious for me to come will appear or not.”
Now, to look upon the invasion of Indiana and Ohio by Morgan seems like
sheer madness. He had a force of only a little over three thousand, and
the states which he invaded had millions of population. But he had reasons
to believe that thousands of that population were friendly to him, would
welcome him with gladness. When he so nearly escaped though no hand was
raised to help him, what would he have accomplished if only a few thousand
had come to his relief? That there were thousands in the two states who
would have flocked gladly to his standard if they had dared, there is no
doubt. But the hand of the government was too strong for them to resist.
The fires of loyalty burned too fiercely to be quenched by them. With all
their boasted strength, the Knights of the Golden Circle were powerless
when the supreme moment came.
The order to cross the river was hailed with enthusiasm by every man in
Morgan’s command. Where they were going they knew not, cared not; they
would go where their gallant leader led. He had never failed them, he
would not fail them now. They knew only that they were to invade the land
of their enemies; that was enough. The war was to be brought home to the
North as it had been to the South. Calhoun caught the fever which caused
the blood of every man to flow more swiftly through his veins. He had been
full of doubts; he trembled for the results if that river were once
passed. He had been through the North and noted her resources, how
terribly in earnest her people were that the Union should be saved. What
if there were thousands of traitors in their midst? There were enough
loyal men left to crush them. What if the state of Indiana was honeycombed
with camps of the Knights of the Golden Circle? The lodges of the Union
League were fully as numerous. He now forgot all these things. Did not the
Knights come to his relief in his hour of sore distress? Surely they would
not forget their oaths, when Morgan came. So he tossed his hat in the air,
and shouted, “Boys, over there is Yankee land! we will cross over and
possess it.”
The order to cross once given, was obeyed with alacrity. In an incredibly
short time the three thousand men and horses were ferried across the
river.
“Burn the boats,” was Morgan’s order.
The torch was applied, and as the flames wrapped them in their fiery
embrace, lo! on the other side came the eager troopers of Hobson. Like
beasts baffled of their prey, they could only stand and gnash their teeth
in their rage. Between them and Morgan rolled the river, and they had no
means of crossing.
“Why don’t you come across, Yanks?” Morgan’s men shouted in derision.
“Got any word you want to send to your mammy? We are going to see her,”
they mockingly cried.
And thus with taunt and laugh and hurrah, Morgan’s men rode away, leaving
their enemies standing helpless on the farther bank.
“Twenty miles to Corydon,” said Calhoun, as he galloped with his scouts to
the front to take the advance. “I wonder if I shall meet my friend Jones,
and whether, when he sees us, he will throw his hat on high, and give us a
royal welcome? If he spoke the truth, the bells of Corydon will ring a
joyful peal when the people see us coming, and we shall be greeted with
waving flags, and find hundreds of sturdy Knights ready to join us.”
But in that twenty miles not a single waving flag did Calhoun see, not a
single shout of welcome did he hear. Instead, the inhabitants seemed to be
in an agony of fear. They met only decrepit old men and white-faced women
and children. Not a single cup of cold water was freely offered them in
that twenty miles. If Calhoun could only have seen the welcome given
Hobson’s men the day after as they came over the same road, the flags that
were waved, the shouts of welcome that greeted them, how women and
children stood by the roadside with cooling water and dainty food to give
them, and sent their prayers after them—if Calhoun could have seen all
these things, his heart would have sunk, and he would have known that
there was no welcome for Morgan’s men in Indiana.
But he was soon to have a ruder awakening. As he neared Corydon, he and
his scouts were greeted with a volley, and sixteen of his men went down.
The raid for them was over.
“Charge!” shouted Calhoun, and like a whirlwind he and his men were on the
little band of home guards, who thought they could withstand Morgan’s
whole force.
In a few brief minutes the fight was over, and on the sod lay several
motionless figures. In spite of himself, Calhoun could not help thinking
of Lexington and the farmer minute men who met Pitcairn and his red-coats
on that April morning in 1775. Were not these men of Corydon as brave? Did
they not deserve a monument as much? He tried to dismiss the thought as
unworthy, but it stayed with him for a long time.
A short distance beyond Corydon stood a fine house, which, with all its
surroundings, showed it to be the dwelling of a rich and prosperous
farmer. When Calhoun came up, the owner, bareheaded and greatly excited,
was engaged in controversy with one of Calhoun’s scouts who had just
appropriated a fine ham from the farmer’s smoke-house and was busily
engaged in tying it to his saddle-bow.
“You have no business to take my property without paying for it!” the
farmer was saying, angrily. “I am a friend of the South; I have opposed
the war from the beginning.”
Seeing Calhoun, and noticing he was an officer, the farmer rushed up to
him, crying, “Stop them! Stop them! they are stealing my property!”
“Well, I declare, if it isn’t my old friend Jones!” exclaimed Calhoun.
“How do you do, Mr. Jones? Where are those five hundred armed Knights who
you said would meet us here? Where is your hat, that you are not throwing
it high in air? Why are you not shouting hallelujahs over our coming?”
Jones had stopped and was staring at Calhoun with open mouth and bulging
eyes. “Bless my soul,” he at length managed to stammer, “if it isn’t Mr.
Harrison!”
“Lieutenant Pennington, at your service. But, Jones, where are those
Knights of the Golden Circle you promised would join us here?”
Jones hung his head. “We—we didn’t expect you to come so soon,” he managed
to answer; “we didn’t have time to rally.”
“Mr. Jones, you told me this whole country would welcome us as liberators.
They did welcome us back there in Corydon, but it was with lead. Sixteen
of our men were killed and wounded. Mr. Jones, there will be several
funerals for you to attend in Corydon.”
“It must be some of those Union Leaguers,” exclaimed Mr. Jones. “Glad they
were killed; they threatened to hang me the other day.”
“They were heroes, compared to you!” hotly exclaimed Calhoun. “You and
your cowardly Knights can plot in secret, stab in the dark, curse your
government, but when it comes to fighting like men you are a pack of
cowardly curs.”
But Mr. Jones hardly heard this fierce Phillipic; his eyes were fixed on
his smoke-house, which was being entered by some more of the soldiers.
“Won’t you stop them,” he cried, wringing his hands; “they will take it
all! Why, you are a pack of thieves!”
“Boys, don’t enter or disturb anything in the house,” cried Calhoun,
turning to his men, “but take anything out of doors you can lay your hands
on; horses, everything.”
The men dispersed with a shout to carry out the order. Calhoun left Mr.
Jones in the road jumping up and down, tearing his hair and shouting at
the top of his voice, “I am going to vote for Abe Lincoln. I am—I am, if I
am damned for it!”
In all probability Morgan’s raid in Indiana and Ohio made more than one
vote for old Abe. Of all the thousands of Knights of the Golden Circle in
Indiana and Ohio, not one took his rifle to join Morgan, not one raised
his hand to help him.
In speaking of this to General Shackelford, who captured him, Morgan said,
bitterly: “Since I have crossed the Ohio I have not seen a single friendly
face. Every man, woman, and child I have met has been my enemy; every
hill-top a telegraph station to herald my coming; every bush an ambush to
conceal a foe.”
The people who lived along the route pursued by Morgan will never forget
his raid. What happened has been told and retold a thousand times around
the fireside, and the story will be handed down not only to their
children, but to their children’s children. Morgan was everywhere
proclaimed as a thief and a robber. They forgot that he had to subsist at
the expense of the country, and that he had to take horses to replace
those of his own which had broken down. Not only that, but it was life to
him to sweep the country through which he passed clear of horses, that his
pursuers might not get them. The Federals in pursuit took horses as
readily as Morgan’s men.
Those who proclaim Morgan a thief and a robber sing with gusto “Marching
through Georgia,” and tell how “the sweet potatoes started from the
ground.” They forget how Sheridan, the greatest cavalry leader of the
Federal army, boasted he had made the lovely Shenandoah Valley such a
waste that a crow would starve to death flying over it. The Southern
people look upon Sherman and Sheridan as the people of Ohio and Indiana
look upon Morgan. These generals were not inhuman; they simply practised
war. It is safe to say that less private property was destroyed in
Morgan’s raid in Indiana and Ohio than in any other raid of equal
magnitude made by either side during the war.
One can now see by reading the dispatches the panic and terror caused by
Morgan in this raid. From Cairo, Illinois, to Wheeling, West Virginia, the
Federals were in a panic, for they knew not which way Morgan would turn,
or where he would strike. From the entire length of the Ohio, the people
were wildly calling on the government to send troops to protect them from
Morgan. There were fears and trembling as far north as Indianapolis.
Governor Tod, of Ohio, declared martial law through the southern part of
his state, and called on Morton to do the same for Indiana. But Morton,
cooler, more careful, and looking farther ahead as to what might be the
effect of such a measure, wisely refused to do so.
From Corydon Morgan rode north to Salem. The Federals now thought for sure
that Indianapolis was his objective point, but from Salem he turned
northeast and swept through the state, touching or passing through in his
route the counties of Jackson, Scott, Jennings, Jefferson, Ripley, and
Dearborn, passing into Ohio, in the northwest corner of Hamilton County,
almost within sight of the great city of Cincinnati. Turning north, he
entered Butler County. Here, as in Indiana, he met only the scowling faces
of enemies.
“And here is where they worship Vallandigham!” exclaimed Calhoun,
passionately. “Here is where they told me almost every man belonged to the
Knights of the Golden Circle, and that the whole county would welcome us.
Here is where even the Democratic party meet in open convention, pass
resolutions in favor of the South, denounce Lincoln as a monster and
tyrant, and demand that the war cease at once and the South go free,
saying they will support no man for office who in the least way favors the
war. And now not a word of welcome, not a single hand reached out in aid.
Oh! the cowards! the cowards!”(3)
Morgan made no bitter reply, but said. “You warned us, Lieutenant, how it
would be. I have expected no aid since the first day we entered Indiana.
But with God’s help we shall yet escape from our foes. Oh, if my gallant
men were across the Ohio once more! It is only that river which stands in
between us and safety. There is now no hope of securing a steamboat. But
at Buffington Island the river is shoal, and can be forded. If we can
reach Buffington Island before our enemies, we can laugh at our pursuers.”
And for Buffington Island Morgan headed, threatening each place along the
way, to keep the Federals guessing where he would attempt to cross. Like a
whirlwind he swept through the counties of Warren, Clermont, Brown, Adams,
Pike, Jackson, Gallia, Meigs, brushing aside like so many flies the
militia which tried to impede his progress.
The goal was nearly reached. Hobson was half a day behind, still trailing,
still following like a bloodhound. The Confederates knew of no force in
front except militia. Safety was before them. The river once passed,
Morgan would have performed the greatest exploit of the war. His men were
already singing songs of triumph, for the river was in sight. Night came
on, but they marched through the darkness, to take position. In the gray
of the morning they would sweep aside the militia and cross over.
In the morning a heavy fog hung over river and land, as if the sun were
afraid to look down upon the scene to be enacted. In the gloom, Colonel
Duke and the dashing Huffman formed their commands and moved to the
attack. They were received with a fire which surprised them, coming as
they supposed from militia. But with loud cheers they swept forward, and
the Federals were forced back, leaving a piece of artillery. A little
farther and the ford would be won; then there came a crashing volley,
mingled with the thunder of artillery, and they saw before them, not
militia, but long lines of blue-coated veterans. General Judah’s brigade
had been transported up the river in steamboats, and landed at Pomeroy.
They had marched all night, and were now in possession of the ford.
In vain the gallant Duke and Huffman struggled against that force. They
were driven back. Flight was to be resumed up the river, when couriers
came dashing in with the news that Hobson was up. They were hemmed in.
There was one place yet, a path through the woods, by which a few could
escape, if the Federal force could be held back for a time.
“Go!” cried Duke to Morgan, “and I will hold them until you are gone.”
“Go!” cried Huffman, faint and bleeding from a wound, “and I will stay and
help Colonel Duke.”
“Go!” cried Calhoun, “if you are saved I care not for myself.”
Then there arose a storm of protests. Who could so well guard and protect
the chief as Calhoun and his scouts? And so, against Morgan’s will,
Calhoun went with him.
“Come, then, we will clear the way,” Calhoun cried to his scouts, and
before the way was closed, six hundred men with Morgan had escaped.
Hemmed in on every side, the Confederates fought as only desperate men can
fight; but as soon as it was known that Morgan was well away, Duke and
Huffman, and with them many other gallant officers, saw it would be
madness to fight longer, and with breaking hearts they surrendered to
their exultant foes. Then it was that some two or three hundred, in spite
of shot and shell, in spite of the leaden hail which fell around them,
plunged down the bank into the river. The bodies of many floated down,
their life blood reddening the water. The current swept many a steed and
rider down, and they were seen no more. A few there were who struggled
through to safety, and these were all that escaped of the thousands that
crossed the Ohio at Brandenburg.