THE RESCUE OF THE SCOUTS
The man who will risk his life for his friends, the leader who never
deserts his band, the soldier who will not escape alone, these are the
men whom history has always hailed as heroes. Some of the greatest
stories of devotion and courage have been those which chronicle the
rescue of men from almost certain death. Courage and devotion have
often opened the dark doors of dungeons, stricken the fetters from
despairing prisoners and saved men doomed to death from the stake, the
block and the gallows.
When the Civil War broke out, the lot of the few Union men left in the
South was a hard one. The fierce passions of those days ran so high
that not only was a Unionist himself liable to death and the
confiscation of his property, but even his family were not safe. In
1863 there was a Georgian who assumed the name of William Morford in
order to protect those of his family who lived in Georgia from the
bitter hatred which his services for the Union had aroused. He was one
of many devoted scouts who worked secretly and single-handed for their
country, claiming no reward if they won and losing their lives on the
gallows if they lost. Morford throughout 1863 was attached to the
command of General Rosecrans and performed many a feat during that
stormy year. It was Morford who burned an important bridge under the
very eyes of a Confederate regiment sent to guard it and who, when the
light from the flames made escape impossible, coolly mingled with the
guards and actually received their congratulations for his bravery in
attempting to put out the fire which he himself had lighted. It was
Morford who single-handed captured a Confederate colonel while he was
sleeping in a house surrounded by his regiment and with his staff in
the next room. Morford obtained access to him under pretense of bearing
an important oral dispatch from General Beauregard himself. They were
left alone with an armed sentry just outside the half-opened door.
Stepping to one side so that he could not be seen by the guard, Morford
suddenly placed a cocked revolver close against the substantial stomach
of the colonel.
"I have been sent, Colonel," he muttered sternly, "to either capture or
kill you. I would rather capture you, for if I kill you I shall have to
fight my way out, but it is for you to say which it shall be."
The colonel was a brave officer, but a cocked revolver against one's
stomach is discouraging even for a hero. He decided instantly that he
much preferred being a prisoner to being a corpse and said as much to
Morford.
"Well," said the latter, still in a tone so low that the sentry could
not make out the words, "I'm glad you feel that way. Get your hat and
tell the guard that you're going to take me out for a talk with some of
the other officers. I'll be right behind you with this revolver in my
sleeve and if anything goes wrong, two bullets will go through the
small of your back."
With this stimulant, the colonel arranged matters entirely to the
scout's satisfaction. He led the way out of the house and through the
lines, giving the countersign himself, in a somewhat shaky voice, and
in a short time the two found themselves within the Union lines.
"I hope I didn't startle you too much, Colonel," said Morford, as he
turned his prisoner over to the guard. "You weren't in any danger, for
my revolver wasn't loaded. I didn't find it out until just as I got to
your lines and I figured out that I probably wouldn't have to shoot
anyway."
As this is a book for good boys and girls, it would not be proper to
set down the colonel's language as he looked at the empty chambers of
Morford's revolver.
Another time the scout was sent by General Rosecrans to find out
whether certain steamboats were on the Hiawassee and if so, where they
were located. On this trip he climbed Cumberland Mountain and on
looking down over the famous Cumberland Gap, he discovered a force of
Confederates who were busily engaged in fortifying the Gap so as to
prevent any federal troops from passing through it. The force consisted
of twenty soldiers and forty or fifty negroes who were doing the work.
Morford made up his mind that it was his business as a Union scout to
stop all such work. Standing out in full sight of the troop, he fired
his revolver at the officer in command. The shot killed the leader's
horse, and horse and man pitched over into the little troop throwing it
into confusion. Morford at once fired a second time and then turning,
waved his hand to an imaginary aide and shouted so that the
Confederates could hear:
"Run back and tell the regiment to hurry up."
He then turned to the opposite ridge and shouted across the Gap to
another imaginary force:
"Lead your men down that path and close in on 'em. Hurry up. My men
will come from this side and we'll beat you down."
By this time the Confederate officer was on his feet again and started
to rally his men. Morford made a rush toward them, firing his revolver
as he came, waving his arms in both directions, shouting to his
imaginary forces and bellowing at the top of his tremendous
voice--"Come on, boys, we've got them now. Surround 'em. Don't let a
man escape!"
The negro workmen felt that this was no place for neutrals and they
dropped their shovels and made a rush for the mouth of the Gap. The
Confederate soldiers stood for a minute, but as they saw Morford
rushing toward them, they broke and followed the workmen. The scout
chased them until he saw that they were well on their way and then
started back along the ridge chuckling to himself over the way in which
they had scattered. He laughed too soon. The Confederates had not gone
far before they found out the trick which had been played upon them.
They turned back and in a short time fifty men were riding along the
ridge at full speed to capture the Yankee who had fooled them so.
Unfortunately for Morford, he had kept to the path along the ridge
which was better going, but which offered very little chance of escape,
since on one side was a sheer precipice while on the other was a long,
bare slope which offered no place for concealment. From the top of a
little knoll he caught sight of the Confederates before they saw him.
At that time they were only a half mile behind. The scout tried to
escape by running far out on a rocky spur which jutted out over the Gap
and which was filled with trees, hoping that he might dodge in among
these, double on his pursuers and so get away. The same officer,
however, whom he had unhorsed caught sight of him as he ran from one
tree to another and with a tremendous shout, the whole band galloped
after him at full speed. Morford had hoped that as the way led up a
steep hill covered with rocks, his pursuers would have to dismount, but
they were riding horses which had been bred in the mountains and which
were trained to go up and down hill-paths like goats. They gained on
him fast. Spreading out they cut off every chance of his escaping back
to the slope or skirting their ranks. There was nothing left for him to
do except to go on and on to the very edge of the precipice. The scout
knew that if he were caught he would be hung on the nearest tree and
that knowledge was a considerable incentive to keep ahead of his
pursuers as long as possible. He ran as he had never run before and as
he could follow paths too narrow for the horses, for a while he managed
to hold his lead. He could see, however, that some of the band had
ridden around the slope and held the whole base of the spur so that it
would be only a question of time before he would be hunted out and
caught. He was running now along the very edge of the precipice which
dropped six hundred feet to the rocks below. The gorge narrowed until
finally at one point it was not more than twenty feet wide. This was
too wide, however, for the scout to clear, even if he were not wearing
heavy boots and carrying a rifle. Several feet below where he stood, on
the opposite shelf a hickory tree had grown out so that some of the
branches extended within ten feet of his side of the gorge. Below that
tree was a fissure through the rock down which a desperate man might
possibly clamber. It was a slight chance, but the only one which he
had. At this point he was hidden from the Confederates by a wall of
rock. Without allowing himself to stop, for fear that he would lose his
nerve, Morford took a run and launched himself through the air ten feet
out and ten feet down against the spreading boughs of the hickory tree.
He broke through them with a rush but wound his arms desperately around
the bending limbs and though they bent and cracked, the tough wood held
and he found himself firmly hugging the shaggy bark of the trunk with
all his might. He slid down, ripping his clothes and skin, until
finally his feet touched the beginning of a possible path down to the
gorge. He could hear the shouts of his pursuers only a few rods away.
If they had gone to the edge, nothing could have saved him, as they
would have shot him down before he could have escaped, but they beat
carefully through the trees and rocks for fear lest he should crawl
back through their line. Without stopping to weigh his chances, Morford
let himself drop from one shelf of rock to another, clinging to every
little crevice and every twig and plant which he could find. Several
times he thought he was gone as his feet swung off into the space
below, but always he managed to get a hand-grip on some rock which
held, and almost before he realized the terrible chance he had taken,
he had passed down the side of the cliff and was safe around a bend in
the rock which hid him from view. From there the path was easier and in
a short time he found himself in the gorge far below. There he crawled
carefully along behind rocks and took advantage of every bit of cover
and in a few minutes was far on his way, leaving the Confederates to
hunt for hours every square yard of ground on the rocky promontory
whence he had come.
This was but one of many similar adventures which made the name of
Morford feared and hated through the Confederate states. The most
desperate as well as the most generous of his many exploits was his
rescue of three fellow-scouts who were held in jail at Harrison,
Tennessee, and were to be shot on May 1st. Morford was then in
Chattanooga and there heard of the capture of these scouts. Chattanooga
at that time was a Confederate town, although it had a number of Union
residents. There did not seem to be any chance of rescuing the
condemned men, yet from the minute that Morford heard that these scouts
were facing death, as he had so often faced it, he made up his mind
that he would rescue them if he had to do it alone.
Morford's mother's name was Kinmont and her earliest ancestor had been
Kinmont Willie, celebrated in the border-wars between England and
Scotland in the latter part of the sixteenth century. Many and many a
time had she sung to him as a child an old Scotch ballad handed down
for centuries through the family, which told of the rescue of this
far-away ancestor by his leader on the night before the day fixed for
his execution. In 1596 Salkeld was the deputy of Lord Scroope, the
English warden of the West Marches, while the Laird of Buccleuch, the
keeper of Liddesdale, guarded the Scotch border. In that year these two
held meetings on the border-line of the kingdoms according to the
custom of the time for the purpose of arranging differences and
settling disputes. On these occasions a truce was always proclaimed
from the day of the meeting until the next day at sunrise. Kinmont
Willie was a follower of the Laird of Buccleuch and was hated by the
Englishmen for many a deed of arms in the numerous border-raids of
those times. After the conference he was returning home attended by
only three or four friends when he was taken prisoner by a couple of
hundred Englishmen and in spite of the truce lodged in the grim Castle
of Carlisle. The Laird of Buccleuch tried first to free him by applying
to the English warden and even to the Scotch embassador, but got no
satisfaction from either and when at last he heard that his retainer
was to be hung three days later, he took the matter into his own hands,
gathered together two hundred of his men, surprised the Castle of
Carlisle and rescued Kinmont Willie by force of arms. The story of this
rescue is told in one of the best as well as one of the least-known of
the Scotch ballads, "Kinmont Willie," the verses of which run as
follows:
O have ye na heard o' the fause Sakelde?
O have ye na heard o' the keen Lord Scroope?
How they hae ta'en bauld Kinmont Willie,
On Haribee to hang him up?
They band his legs beneath the steed,
They tied his hands behind his back;
They guarded him, fivesome on each side,
And they brought him over the Liddel-rack.
Now word is gane to the bauld Keeper,
In Branksome Ha' where that he lay,
That Lord Scroope has ta'en the Kinmont Willie,
Between the hours of night and day.
He has ta'en the table wi' his hand,
He garr'd the red wine spring on hie--
"Now Christ's curse on my head," he said,
"But avenged of Lord Scroope I'll be!
"O were there war between the lands,
As well I wot that there is none,
I would slight Carlisle castell high,
Though it were builded of marble stone.
"I would set that castell in a low,
And sloken it with English blood!
There's never a man in Cumberland,
Should ken where Carlisle castell stood.
"But since nae war's between the lands,
And there is peace, and peace should be;
I'll neither harm English lad or lass,
And yet the Kinmont freed shall be!"
He has call'd him forty Marchmen bauld,
Were kinsmen to the bauld Buccleuch;
With spur on heel, and splent on spauld,
And gleuves of green, and feathers blue.
And as we cross'd the Bateable Land,
When to the English side we held,
The first o'men that we met wi',
Whae sould it be but fause Sakelde?
"Where be ye gaun, ye hunters keen?"
Quo' fause Sakelde; "come tell to me!"
"We go to hunt an English stag,
Has trespass'd on the Scots countrie."
"Where be ye gaun, ye marshal men?"
Quo' fause Sakelde; "come tell me true!"
"We go to catch a rank reiver,
Has broken faith wi' the bauld Buccleuch."
"Where are ye gaun, ye mason lads,
Wi' a' your ladders lang and hie?"
"We gang to berry a corbie's nest,
That wons not far frae Woodhouselee."
"Where be ye gaun, ye broken men?"
Quo' fause Sakelde; "come tell to me!"
Now Dickie of Dryhope led that band,
And the nevir a word of lear had he.
"Why trespass ye on the English side?
Row-footed outlaws, stand!" quo' he;
The nevir a word had Dickie to say,
Sae he thrust the lance through his fause bodie.
And when we left the Staneshaw-bank,
The wind began full loud to blaw;
But 'twas wind and weet, and fire and sleet,
When we came beneath the castle wa'.
We crept on knees, and held our breath,
Till we placed the ladders against the wa';
And sae ready was Buccleuch himsell
To mount the first before us a'.
He has ta'en the watchman by the throat,
He flung him down upon the lead--
Had there not been peace between our lands,
Upon the other side thou hadst gaed!
"Now sound out, trumpets!" quo' Buccleuch;
"Let's waken Lord Scroope right merrilie!"
Then loud the warden's trumpet blew--
"O wha dare meddle wi' me?"
Then speedilie to work we gaed,
And raised the slogan ane and a',
And cut a hole through a sheet of lead,
And so we wan to the castle ha'.
They thought King James and a' his men
Had won the house wi' bow and spear;
It was but twenty Scots and ten,
That put a thousand in sic' a stear!
Wi' coulters, and wi' forehammers,
We garr'd the bars bang merrilie,
Until we came to the inner prison,
Where Willie o' Kinmont he did lie.
And when we cam to the lower prison,
Where Willie o' Kinmont he did lie--
"O sleep ye, wake ye, Kinmont Willie,
Upon the morn that thou's to die?"
"O I sleep saft, and I wake aft,
It's lang since sleeping was fley'd frae me;
Gie my service back to my wife and bairns,
And a' gude fellows that spier for me."
Then Red Rowan has hente him up,
The starkest man in Teviotdale--
"Abide, abide now, Red Rowan,
Till of my Lord Scroope I take farewell."
"Farewell, farewell, my gude Lord Scroope!
My gude Lord Scroope, farewell!" he cried--
"I'll pay you for my lodging maill,
When first we meet on the Border side."
Then shoulder high, with shout and cry,
We bore him down the ladder lang;
At every stride Red Rowan made,
I wot the Kinmont's airns play'd clang.
"O mony a time," quo' Kinmont Willie,
"I have ridden horse baith wild and wood;
But a rougher beast than Red Rowan
I ween my legs have ne'er bestrode."
"And mony a time," quo' Kinmont Willie,
"I've prick'd a horse out oure the furs;
But since the day I back'd a steed,
I never wore sic cumbrous spurs."
We scarce had won the Staneshaw-bank,
When a' the Carlisle bells were rung,
And a thousand men on horse and foot
Cam wi' the keen Lord Scroope along.
Buccleuch has turn'd to Eden Water,
Even where it flow'd frae bank to brim,
And he has plunged in wi' a' his band,
And safely swam them through the strem.
He turn'd him on the other side,
And at Lord Scroope his glove flung he--
"If ye like na my visit in merry England,
In fair Scotland come visit me!"
"All sore astonish'd stood Lord Scroope,
He stood as still as rock of stane;
He scarcely dared to trew his eyes,
When through the water they had gone.
"He is either himsell a devil fra hell,
Or else his mother a witch maun be;
I wadna have ridden that wan water,
For a' the gowd in Christentie."
The memory of that brave rescue nearly three hundred years before, as
the scout afterward told his friends, was what inspired him to save his
fellow-scouts as Buccleuch had saved the first William Kinmont. By
saving the lives of these three men he would pay with interest for the
life of his ancestor. Shakespeare writes somewhere that the good which
men do is oft buried with their bones, but that their evil deeds live
on forever. No more mistaken lines have ever been written. Evil brings
about its own death. No good deed is ever forgotten or ever buried.
Hundreds of years later it may flash out through the dust of centuries
and light the path of high endeavor.
Morford scoured Chattanooga and finally found nine men who were ready
to go with him and try to rescue the condemned scouts. Leaving
Chattanooga they traveled by night and hid by day in caves and thickets
among the mountains. Occasionally they would meet or get word from men
whom they knew to be Union sympathizers. Finally they hid on the top of
Bear Mountain which towered above the river and which separated them
from Harrison where was located the jail. Although they had traveled
fast and far they were only just in time. The second noon after the
night when they reached the mountain had been fixed for the execution.
On Bear Mountain they hid in a cave which Morford himself had
discovered when hunting there many years before. It could only be
reached by a narrow path which ran along a shelf of rock which jutted
out over a precipice three hundred feet deep. The path turned sharply
and led under an enormous overhanging ledge and ended in a deep cave
with a little mountain spring bubbling up on a mossy slope only ten
feet wide which led up to the cave's entrance. Inside was a dry, high
cavern large enough to hold fifty men. It could not be reached from
above by reason of the over-hanging ledge. At that point the path
stopped and where the slope ended was a sheer drop to the rocks below
which extended around the farther side of the slope so that the only
entrance was around the path's bend along which only one man could pass
at a time. Morford reached the foot of Bear Mountain just at sunset and
led his little band up the steep side by a winding deer-path, the
entrance to which was concealed in a tangled thicket of green briar and
could only be reached by crawling underneath the sharp thorns like
snakes. The path to the cave was no place for a man with weak nerves.
It was bad enough as it skirted the precipice, but where it took a
sharp bend around the jutting point of rock, it narrowed to nothing
more than a foothold not three inches wide. He who would pass into the
cave must turn with his back to the precipice and edge his way with
arms outstretched along the smooth face of the rock for nearly ten
feet. The point at the turn was the worst. There it was necessary to
take one foot off the ledge and grope for a tiny foothold below the
path while one shuffled around the curve. It was not absolutely
necessary for Morford and his men to spend the night in this cave.
There were other places where they could have stayed in safety, as no
one suspected their presence. Morford, however, had made up his mind to
choose his men with the utmost care. It was necessary in order to save
the lives of the three condemned scouts to pass through the camp of the
soldiers and the ring of guards encircling the jail, break open the
jail, rescue the prisoners and break out again. It was a desperate
chance and Morford's only hope of success was to have men who would
show absolute coolness and daring throughout the whole adventure. The
nine men whom he had selected all bore a high reputation for courage,
but Morford decided like Gideon of old to cut out every factor of
weakness and leave only the picked men. When Gideon was chosen of God
to rescue the children of Israel from the unnumbered host of Midianites
and Amalekites and the other Bedouin hordes of the desert which were
encamped in the great valley that lay at the hill of Moreh, he started
with a force of thirty-two thousand. When this army looked down upon
the innumerable hosts of the fierce desert warriors, it began to weaken
and Gideon sent back twenty-two thousand soldiers who had showed signs
of fear. The night before the day fixed for battle, Gideon decided to
select from this ten thousand a picked band of men who would be not
only brave, but watchful and ready for any emergency. As his army
swarmed down to the water-hole Gideon watched the men as they drank.
They had kept watch and ward on that bare sun-smitten mountain top all
through the long, hot day. As they came to the water some of the
thirsty men dashed forward out of the ranks and fell on their faces and
lapped the water like dogs without a thought that there might be an
ambush at the ford and without a care that they were lying absolutely
defenseless before any enemy who might attack them. Others kneeled on
their hands and knees and drank. Of the ten thousand only three hundred
had bravery and self-control enough to maintain the discipline of a
vigilant army. Without laying down their weapons they drank as a deer
drinks, watching on every side for fear of a surprise. With one hand
they scooped up the water, in the other they held fast their weapon. It
was slower, but it was safer. These three hundred men Gideon chose for
that band which for three thousand years has been the symbol of bravery
and watchfulness. With this little force just before dawn he burst down
upon the sleeping Midianites which were as the sand by the sea for
multitude. The three hundred were divided into three companies. Each
man carried a sword, a trumpet, and an earthenware pitcher with a
lighted lamp inside. From three separate directions they rushed down
upon the sleeping foe and sounded the trumpets and brake the pitchers
and held the flashing lamps on high and then shouting as their
watchword, "The Sword of the Lord and of Gideon," they burst into the
great camp of the invaders. Roused from sleep, hearing the trumpet
notes and the crash of the breaking pitchers and seeing the flash of
lights from all sides and mighty voices shouting the fierce slogan, the
Midianites scattered like sheep and all that great host ran and cried
and fled and every man's sword was against his fellow in the darkness,
and when day dawned the ground was covered with dead men, the camp was
abandoned and nothing was left of that mighty army but a fringe of
fugitives scattered in every direction.
It may be that some such test was in Morford's mind as the little band
of nine scaled the heights of Bear Mountain. At any rate as they
approached the precipice-path he halted them.
"Boys," he said, "I got word this afternoon that these scouts have only
thirty-six hours to live unless we save them. The guards have been
doubled. It's going to be a desperate chance to get to them and none of
us may ever come back. Now if any of you fellows want to quit, the time
to do it is now rather than later. I'm going to lead the way along the
path which we used to say was the best nerve-tonic in this county. If
any of you fellows get discouraged and don't want to make the last turn
past old Double-Trouble, why back out, go over the top of the mountain
and down the other side. You know your way home and you've got
provisions enough to last for the trip. Only travel fast, for those of
us who are left are going to come right over the top of this mountain
on the run with those scouts--if we save 'em."
With this characteristic oration, Morford started along the path, first
tightening his heavy revolver belt so that it might not swing out and
over-balance him at the critical moment. He was instantly followed by
six others, quiet, self-contained men who like him had taken up
scouting as the best way of showing their devotion to the Union. The
other three hesitated a moment, looked at each other shamefacedly and
then slowly followed along the dangerous route. As Morford reached
Double-Trouble, he stopped and in a low voice told the next man how to
put one foot out into space and search for the little foothold which
jutted out below the main path and then how to swing around that
desperate curve. Slowly and with infinite caution each one of the six
followed their leader and found himself safe on the slope of the cave.
The seventh man listened carefully to the instructions of the man
before him as to how he should round the curve and gave a gasp of
horror when he found that he must balance himself on one foot on a
three-inch ledge while the other was in mid-air.
"Tell General Morford," he finally said, "that I ain't no tight-rope
walker. I draw the line at holdin' on like a fly, head downward over
this old precipice. Anyway I don't think there's any chance to do
anything and I'm goin' home."
He seemed to have voiced the exact sentiments of the other two who had
sidled up and with out-stretched necks were examining in the faint
light the curve around Double-Trouble. The last man spent no time in
any argument.
"Good-bye, General," he called in a low voice. "Go as far as you
like--but go without me."
That was the last Morford and the other six ever saw of those men. They
reached home in safety after some days of wandering, but decided to
choose another territory where the scouting would not be quite so
strenuous. Morford and his men made themselves comfortable that night.
They drank deep from the spring and then had a much-needed scrub. After
a hearty meal they turned in and slept like dead men through the next
day on the crisp springy moss, first rolling a big boulder against the
side of Double-Trouble so that no one could pass.
Late the next afternoon they awoke and found that the path was not so
bad the second time as it had been the first. Down the mountainside by
the same concealed route they marched in single file and just at dark
crossed the river and entered the little village of Harrison. There
they were met by an old man with whom Morford had previously
communicated. He had obtained by strategy the countersign which would
take them through the soldiers, the guards and to the very entrance of
the jail itself. Curiously enough, some Confederate officer had fixed
as the countersign that very one with which Gideon had conquered so
many years ago. "The Sword of Gideon" was the open sesame which would
take them past the guards and unlock the gates which ringed about the
doomed men. Morford accepted it as a good omen. The night before he had
told his companions the old story of Gideon's test and it came to them
all as a direct message that God was fighting on their side as he had
fought of old against even greater odds. Morford planned to use
Gideon's tactics. He decided to surprise and confuse his enemy and
escape in the confusion. He tied the hands of two of his band behind
their backs and with the other four marched directly to the Confederate
camp, gave the countersign, and stated that he had prisoners to deliver
to the jail. The sleepy sentry passed him through without any comment
and they marched until they came to the high board fence with a double
row of spikes on top which surrounded the prison-yard. This fence at
one point touched the edge of a marsh filled with rank grass, briars
and tussocks. To this point Morford had gone earlier in the evening and
had bored two auger-holes in one of the boards and then with a small
saw dipped in oil had carefully sawed out one of the old timbers,
leaving a space just large enough to admit of a man passing through.
There was only one entrance to the prison grounds which was through the
main gate besides which night and day sat two guards. Morford rang at
this gate and when it was opened, presented himself with his pretended
prisoners. One of the guards accompanied them to the main jail toward
which Morford marched with his prisoners and two men, leaving the other
two behind with the remaining guard. Morford had no more than passed
around the corner when these two suddenly seized the unsuspecting guard
at the gate, pressed a revolver against his temple and in an instant
gagged him, tied him up hand and foot with rope which they had brought
and started to the jail to assist the others. Usually the jail was only
guarded by the jailer and one deputy or assistant who lived there with
him. To-night, however, there was a death-watch of three extra men
heavily armed stationed around in the corridor in front of the cells of
the condemned men. The jailer opened the door and the sentry who had
accompanied Morford from the gate explained that these were two
prisoners coming under guard from Chattanooga, and Morford and his men
were admitted. Every detail had been planned out ahead and the
prisoners tottered into the corridor in an apparently exhausted
condition and approached the guards who were waiting in front of the
cells, or rather cages, in which were the condemned men. Suddenly just
as the supposed prisoners came close, the ropes dropped off their hands
and each of said hands grasped a particularly dangerous looking
revolver which was aimed directly at the heads of the astonished
guards.
"Sit still," said one of the prisoners, "and keep on sitting still
because I have very nervous fingers and if they twitch, these revolvers
are likely to go off."
The guards followed this advice and in an instant were disarmed and
roped up like the guard at the gate. So far everything had gone like
clockwork according to program. The jailer, however, had yet to be
reckoned with. As he did not seem to be armed, Morford had stepped
forward to assist in disarming the guards when with a tremendous spring
the jailer reached the door, pulled it open and with the same motion
kicked a chair at Morford who had sprung after him. Morford tripped
over the chair and before he could get the door open, the jailer had
cleared the staircase with one jump and was out of the jail, running
toward the entrance. Morford and two others ran after him, but he had
too much of a start and reached the gate fifty yards ahead. This jailer
was cool enough to stop at the gate long enough to pull a knife from
his belt. With this he slashed the ropes of the bound guard, pulled him
to his feet and they both disappeared together through the open gate in
spite of a couple of revolver shots which Morford sent after them. The
latter, however, was prepared for any emergencies. He told off two of
his men to shut and bar the gates and to guard against any attack. Two
others were to run around and around the fence on the inside shouting
and firing as rapidly and as often as their breath and ammunition would
allow. With one companion he returned to the jail and demanded the keys
from the tethered guard.
"The jailer's got them, Captain," said one of the guards; "he always
carries them with him and there isn't a duplicate key in the place."
There was no time to be lost. Already could be heard outside the
Confederate camp the shouts of the officers to the men to fall in. Only
the tremendous turmoil which apparently was going on inside saved the
day for Morford. It would have been an easy thing to force the rickety
old fence at any point or to dash in at the gate if the Confederates
had known how small a force of rescuers there were. They, however,
believed that the jail must have been surprised by some large Union
force and they spent precious time in throwing out skirmishers,
mustering the men and preparing to defend against a flank attack. In
the meantime Morford had rushed into the jailer's room and found lying
there a heavy axe. With this he tried to break into the cells of the
condemned men who were shaking the bars and cheering on their plucky
rescuers. The door of the cell was locked and also barred with heavy
chains. Morford was a man of tremendous strength and swinging the axe,
in a short time he managed to snap the chains apart and smash in the
outer lock and with the aid of an iron bar pried open the door only to
find that there was an inside door with a tremendous lock of wrought
steel against which his axe had absolutely no effect. Time was going.
Already they could hear the shouted commands of the Confederate
officers just outside the fence and Morford expected any moment to see
the door fly in and receive a charge from a couple of hundred armed
men. As he wiped the sweat off his forehead, out of the corner of his
eye he saw one of the guards grinning derisively at him. This was
enough for Morford. Dropping the axe, he cocked his revolver and with
one jump was beside the guard. Placing the cold muzzle of his weapon
against the guard's temple, he ordered him to tell him instantly where
the keys were. There's no case on record where any man stopped laughing
quicker than did that guard.
"I ain't got 'em, Captain," he gasped, "really I ain't."
"I'm going to count ten," said Morford, inflexibly, "and if I don't
hear where those keys are by the time I say ten, I'm going to pull the
trigger of this forty-four. Then I'm going to count ten more and do the
same with the next man and the next. If I can't save these prisoners,
I'm going to leave three guards to go along with them."
Morford got as far as three when the guard, whose voice trembled so
that he could scarcely make himself heard, shouted at the top of his
voice:
"There's a key in the pants-pocket of each one of us."
In spite of the emergency they were facing Morford's men could not help
laughing at the expression on their leader's face as he stood and
stared at the speaker.
"I have a great mind," he said at last, "to shoot you fellows anyway as
a punishment for being such liars and for making me chop up about two
cords of iron bars."
"You wouldn't shoot down prisoners, General," faltered one of the
Confederates.
"No, I wouldn't," said Morford, commencing to grin himself, "but I
ought to."
As he talked he had been fitting the key into the locks and with the
last words the door opened and the condemned scouts were once more free
men. There was not an instant to lose. Already the Confederates were
battering away at the front gate with a great log and a fusillade of
revolver-shots showed that the outer guards were doing all they could
to stand off the attack. It took only a moment to arm the scouts with
the weapons taken from the guards and in a minute the seven men were
out in the prison-yard. Morford himself ran to the gate, stooping in
the darkness to avoid any chance shots that might fly through and
ordered the two guards, who were lying flat on either side of the gate
shooting through the bars at the soldiers outside, to join the others
at the place where the plank had been removed. It took only a minute
for the men to rush across the dark yard and reach the farther corner
of the fence. Morford sent them through the opening one by one. Like
snakes they crept into the tall grass, wormed their way through the
tussocks into the thick marsh beyond and disappeared in the darkness.
They were only just in time. As Morford himself crept through the
opening last the gate crashed in and with a whoop and a yell a file of
infantry poured into the yard. At the same moment another detachment
dashed around on the outside in order to make an entrance at the rear
of the supposed Union forces. Morford had hardly time to dive under the
briars like a rabbit when a company of soldiers reached the opening
through which he had just passed.
"Here's the place, Captain," he heard one of them say in a whisper.
"Here's the place where they broke in."
The Confederate officer hurried his men through the gap, not realizing
that it was really the place where the rescuers had broken out. As the
last man disappeared through the fence, Morford crept on into the
marsh, took the lead of his men and following a little fox-path soon
had them safe on the other side and once again they started for Bear
Mountain. They reached the boat in safety and in a few minutes they
were on the other side of the river. Instead of getting out at the
landing, however, Morford rowed down and made the men get out and make
a distinct trail for a hundred yards or so to a highway which led off
in an opposite direction from the mountain. Then they came back and got
into the boat again while Morford rowed to where an old tree hung clear
out over the water. A few feet from this tree was a stone wall. Morford
instructed his men to swing themselves up through the tree and jump as
far out as possible on the wall and to follow that for a hundred yards
and then spring out from the wall some ten or fifteen feet before
starting for the mountain. When they had all safely reached the wall,
Morford himself climbed into the tree and set the boat adrift and again
took charge of his party. Some of the younger scouts, who had never
been hunted by dogs, were inclined to think that their leader was
unnecessarily cautious. The next morning, however, as they lay safe and
sound on the slope of the cave at the top of Bear Mountain and saw
party after party of soldiers and civilians leading leashed bloodhounds
back and forth along the river-bank, they decided that their captain
knew his business. Their pursuers picked up the trail which was lost
again in the highway and finally decided that the men must have escaped
along the road, although the dogs were, of course, unable to follow it
more than a hundred yards. For three days the scouts lay safe on the
mountainside and rested up for their long trip north. Several times
parties went up and down Bear Mountain, but fortunately did not find
the hidden deer-path nor was Morford called upon to stand siege behind
old Double-Trouble. When the pursuit was finally given up and the
soldiers all seemed to be safe back in camp, Morford led his little
troop out and following the same secret paths by which they had come,
landed them all with the Union forces at Murfreesboro.
So ended one of the many brave deeds of a forgotten hero.