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Updated: May 1, 2025
The pulses of the three newcomers beat the quicker as they recognized in them members of the proposed bridge-burning expedition. Among them was Andrews. "Yes," he was saying, in a perfectly natural manner, to the hotel clerk, who stood behind a desk; "we Kentuckians must push on early tomorrow morning. The South has need of all the men she can muster."
Every dollar they could raise was invested in the beautiful sloping lands of the upper Hudson. Rolf urged the largest possible purchase now. Hendrick looked somewhat aghast at such a bridge-burning move. But a purchaser for his farm was found with unexpected promptness, one who was not on farming bent and the way kept opening up.
So we will do our bridge-burning and our train-stealing on Friday, before the railroad is obstructed with trains bringing Confederate reinforcements to the latter city." Even in the darkness one could detect the gleam in the eyes of the men as they saw before them, with pleasure rather than fear, the risky part they were to play in the drama of warfare. The eyes of George sparkled, likewise.
But to the anxious travelers any risk, however great, seemed preferable to waiting. If they missed the evening train from Chattanooga to Marietta their usefulness was ended. No bridge-burning adventure for them! "I tell you we must get over to-night," urged Jenks, who hoped that his uniform would give him a certain prestige in the eyes of the ferryman.
The organization of home-guards gave to these armed bodies of men the power, and with it came the temptation to abuse it. The memory of the men who had been hanged for bridge-burning, and of those who had languished and died in prison charged with no crime but disloyalty to the Confederacy, was a constant stimulus to severity. Their blood seemed to cry from the ground.
They had been most gloriously and successfully duped. This Major Lightfoot was none other than Walter Jenks, a sergeant from General Mitchell's camp, whom Andrews had sent out on the bridge-burning party. Jenks shook the three warmly by the hand. "It was a mean trick to play on you fellows," he explained, lowering his voice, "but for the life of me I couldn't resist the temptation."
The outlook was not at all enlivening; our regiment was small in number, the woods dark and treacherous, the main army adding mile upon mile to the interval between us, and we were very forcibly impressed that even railroad-smashing, in plenty of company, was far better than bridge-burning with such lonesome surroundings.
If Calhoun had known that Nichol’s only son had been hanged the winter before by the Confederate authorities for bridge-burning, and that his sister had sworn revenge, he would not have been at a loss as to who had fired the deadly shot, for every mountain girl can use a rifle. From Sparta Morgan made a rapid march to Selina, where he forded the Cumberland River.
He was very well satisfied with his bridge-burning and his capture of prisoners, and in his satisfaction he never gave thought to me. I waited in my hiding-place, expecting that, as we had agreed, the firing would begin from the east, but nothing happened.
They've been trying to mix me up with that bridge-burning at Smoky Creek; Sugar Buttes, they had me there; Tower W nothing would do but I was there, and they've got one of the men in jail down there now, Lance, trying to sweat enough perjury out of him to send me up. What show has a poor man got against all the money there is in the country?
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