STRANGE OUTCOME OF A FALSE ALARM
After deserting the old warehouse as our picket post, we had to make
some kind of “frame up” to report to our captain of the guard. It was
about one mile to where the reserve was encamped on the hill. We mounted
our horses and went up, very much excited from the owl scare, and told
the officer that we were sure that we had heard a boat approaching; and
instantly the camp became a center of activity. The battery at Chickasaw
Bluff was notified to be ready for action at daylight, and a runner was
sent to Iuka to notify the commander that the gunboats were approaching
and with orders to be in readiness to send a sufficient force to prevent
a landing upon call.
As I witnessed all this commotion and preparation based upon our
falsehood, my conscience smote me bitterly, and I do not know what
would have become of us but for the fact that the gunboats actually
came. While all except the two false messengers waited in expectancy,
soon after daylight, two boats came into view, approaching cautiously.
When opposite the landing, they stopped for a little while and then
turned to go back down the river. It was then that the battery at
Chickasaw Bluff opened fire on them. Our gunners were poor marksmen and
could not make a hit; so, after the exchange of a few shots, the boats
dropped down the river.
Two years later Morton’s battery of our command, from this same point
literally riddled and captured a gunboat of this type.
It was apparent that the purpose of the enemy was to land a force as
near the railroad as possible, and Eastport seemed the natural point, as
Iuka, on the railroad, was only eight miles away; but the discovery that
Eastport was in the hands of the Confederates and the fact that the
surrounding hills and bluffs were peculiarly adapted to defense probably
caused the Federal commander to change his plan.
After the gunboats had sailed away, I was selected, with three comrades,
to follow down the river bank and watch for the chosen landing place of
the Union Army. When crossing Yellow Creek just above where it flows
into the river, there was a gunboat shelling the woods. Leaving the
river where it makes a bend, we rode across the neck of land to
Childer’s Hill, in front of Hamburg. We could see the smoke of a steamer
that seemed to be lying at the wharf; and as we expected troops to land
here, we were discussing the advisability of going down to the village,
when the boat fired a solid shot at us, which passed over our heads. We
immediately whirled our horses into the woods, bearing down the river,
when the second shot came and hit the ground we had just left. We went
on down toward Pittsburg Landing, and the gunboats shelled the woods
along the river between Hamburg and Pittsburg Landing during all of the
afternoon.
About dark we arrived at the home of Thomas Fraley, near Shiloh Church,
and accepted his invitation to spend the night under his roof. He told
us that he had visited the Landing late in the afternoon, and that no
troops were there, but that the gunboats were very active between this
place and Hamburg, where, he was sure, troops were being landed; that
two transports of soldiers had passed up the river during the day,
probably to be landed at Hamburg or at some place above there. We did
not then know, what developed later, that the Federal commander, after
abandoning Eastport as a landing place, had selected the mouth of Yellow
Creek, above Hamburg. But it was impossible to get a footing there, as
the water was all over the landing place. So the transports dropped back
to Pittsburg Landing, which place was finally selected from sheer
necessity on account of its high bluff and its ridge road leading from
the river to Corinth, Miss., twenty-two miles away.
Apprehending no danger in spending the night with our friend, Fraley,
though very close to the river, we turned in for the night, enjoying a
good supper and a comfortable bed. This home was a short distance west
of Shiloh Church, on the Stantonville Road.
Rain was falling the next morning, and so we did not hurry away. Thus
early in the war soldiers were guilty of many things which a year later
would not have been tolerated. After the sections had grappled each
other in the deadly conflict, there was no more sleeping in houses
within gunshot of the enemy without a picket or vidette.
About eight o’clock, while we were saddling our horses, some country
boys passed, riding mules, and told us they were going down to the
Landing. In a few minutes we bade adieu to our friend, Fraley, and,
after riding down the road a short distance, we turned into the woods to
strike the country road leading back to Hamburg. When we crossed the
Corinth and Pittsburg Landing Road, we discovered a regiment of cavalry
passing in the direction of Pea Ridge, and we soon became aware of the
presence of large bodies of troops being disembarked at Pittsburg
Landing. Fully appreciating our danger, we avoided all roads and went to
Corinth and apprised General Johnston of the landing place of the
Federal Army.
Shortly after this I saw Mr. Fraley, and he told me how narrowly I had
escaped being captured. As we were leaving his house, a regiment of
cavalry came up at a gallop, four abreast, with guns ready for action.
We had just turned a bend in the road, which hid us from view. The
colonel of the regiment asked Mr. Fraley what had become of the soldiers
who were there a few minutes ago. He told them we had just left, and
they rode rapidly down the road after us. So it happened that our
turning into the woods was all that saved us.
I have related this incident somewhat at length to illustrate the
necessity of unbroken vigilance and the danger of the slightest
carelessness in time of war.
The Federal transports had begun disembarking troops that morning, and,
very naturally, they advanced along the roads leading away from the
Landing, taking possession of the country for several miles west of the
river.
As soon as General Johnston learned of this latest move of the enemy he
began his arrangements to meet it.