Civil War Story...

[Wheeler]

This story was written by my friend Jeannie Travis who is on a mailing list with me... she gave me permission to put her little story here... I hope some of you enjoy it... I did!!!

Mary

 

GEORGE W. SCHUFF, Confederate Soldier

 

I am George W Schuff, which is a mite confusin since Pa didn't give me no double name and he spelt his name Shuff, so I'll tell you how that come about...I put that W in there my own self 'cos the mail carrier was always gittin mine and Pa's mail mixed up, and I 'd git my dander up when Pa would hand me a letter of mine he'd opened up...Seems like ever time

he jist had to give his opinion on my business .... That 'C' stuck in the middle of my last name was somethin I studied on long and hard. Ya see, this storekeeper over at Clarksville asked me one time was I Jewish, said Shuff was a Jewish name...Well, I know for a certain fact we aint, and those folks seem to git throwed off on a good bit, so I stuck that

C in the middle and that was the end of that.

 

I'm settin' here on my front porch this evenin, lookin out acrost the holler, jist thinkin of all the long steps that brought me to this time and place... These cool days git me to thinkin of the time when me and my brothers Samuel and James marched off to fight the Yankees..joinin up with A Co., the 15th Tennessee Infantry ...Mama didn't want Sam to go

with us, but he snuck off and they wasn't much she could do against it once he had done put his name down on the list .

 

We made our way over to Ft Donelson, at Dover, TN., and this was a big trip for us as we hardly ever set foot out of our holler. We hadn't a notion of how many hard fought miles from our cabins we would travel before we seen them again...Them soldiers kept us right busy digging ditches, and throwing that rocky dirt up to make big long banks in front of 'em...We was to use 'em for cover if the Yanks ever got brave enough to try for us...Well, shore enough they come at us, and nary a one of us begrudged a inch of them ditches we had worked so hard on! That first battle was a lolly paloozer, and pore little Sam hit out fer home at first light ! Said he was through with war...Since it weren't far over there to our holler, they sent after Sam and locked him up in the Powder Magazine...There wasn't no jail. They was all set to hang him at daybreak, but I got my courage up and went to have a talk with the Boss man. After I told him Sam weren't but 16 years old and never bin away from home before, he allowed as how I could git him out if he promised on his honor not to run off again ... He didn't ever have cause to regret his mercy, because Sam stayed right in the fight till the war was done -- That little old Powder magazine is still over there at 'Donelson, setting right behind them big cannons aimed up River toward the North. If them Yanks had got lucky and lobbed a round in there just right it might have blowed up their cannons and all the gunpowder, not to mention my brother Sam !

 

It was mighty worrisome listening to the wrangling coming from the Generals that was supposed to be leading us to a great victory! Seems like the jealousy, back stabbing, and jist plain ol stupidness kept us boys beat down all the time. Rumor's said Grant was heading our way, and Surrender talk was floatin in the air.

 

Nathan Bedford Forrest was ever among us , and was admired and loved by all of us fellers. Try as he might he jist couldn't get them big shots to listen to him talking horse sense ...As we laid there in them trenches in the cold and snow waiting for the Yanks to overrun us, Forrest made up

his mind to ride right on out of there, and he said anybody that wanted to go to git ready...I hated to throw away the extra clothes my wife Isobel had made for me on her loom, but Forrest said we had to git rid of everything extry that we could so's we could ride far and fast. We had to muffle up any thang that jangled and cut our extra blankets up to tie on our horses hooves to deaden the sound...Since we rode out in the middle of a turrible sleet storm, I don't think them Yankees would have noticed us if we had rode right through their camp! We didn't lose a single man, and Forrest was riding mighty tall in the saddle for being proved right.

 

Yep, we got away slick as a whistle, and me and big brother James rode and fought with Forrest and follered the war all down through Georgia and Mississippi, til it finally wound down all them terrible months later......Many's the time I was glad we had talked young Sam into staying up there closer to home, 'cause Mama set so much store by that half growed boy.

 

When they turned us fellers loose we was way down in Brandon, Mississippi, and brother James was laid low by a bad timed bullet. I was desperate to let the folks at home know we was all right, so when the Doc said James could stay at his house there till he got well enough to travel I hit out fer Tennessee....I had me a fine horse and a mort of gear that I had put together from offen Yankees kilt during our long

running fight, and so I made it back to Mama's in pretty fair

shape...Weren't long before we got word James had took the fever and died down there in Mississippi, and the Doc had buried him as decent as he could...I jest wish we could'a marked his grave somehow.

 

There wadn't no hard money floating around to buy a farm with in them hard times, but a neighbor of Pa's saw that fine horse of mine, and offered to trade me his little 67 acre farm for it. He had lost heart after his wife and kids was carried off by the slow fever, and wanted to jist get on that horse and head out West and start over...Me and my Isobel moved inta that fine 2 story log house with it's big lean to kitchen, and I set in to farm my few acres ....I also took on a job

working at a iron monger's and learnt to make big old iron kittles and such...I had to make up my own pattern for them kittles, and we made a mort of them.....

 

Looking around as I set here in my rocking chair -- made from willer sprouts I cut over on Yellow Creek -- I caint hardly believe this is the same bare place I come to after The War. As Isobel birthed the children we got crowded, so I built another 2 story log building and added on a dog trot hallway to hook up the two..It aint a wide hall ...jist wide enough to walk around the big stone chimney that is the finest part of my

holding...Next thang I bilt was a porch all acrost the front here, and I put up a rail to cock my feet up on. Why, I've built I don't know how many barns, sheds, rail fences, paling fences, and a real fine smoke house out back since I got

home from The War.

 

It's right peaceful setting here, watching the little creek that whispers over rocks as it runs along the edge of the front yard, and I can hear the kids playin' on the bluff behind the house. They climb them rocky cliffs like little goats, and run and play in the woods all day long. Nobody has to coax 'em to eat their supper at night, just make sure they's plenty of beans and cornbread to fill them up...Lets see, there's Annie, Elizabeth, Etta, Velma, Effie Nancy, George William, Lurton, Vida Lee, and Ottis. Sadly, we had to bury the 3 little boy babes Isobel bore one winter morning ... They shore would have been something to brag about as they growed up jist alike, but the Lord knows best...

 

I passed on to Glory in 1917, at the age of 74, which is a grand age for shore after the hard and war torn life I lived , but my beloved Isobel persevered on til 1947...safe in the love of her family. Our children growed up straight and true on the banks of this little creek, and only my 'tomboy' daughter Effie Nancy never married, just stayed home to take

care of her Mama...She said she always asked herself if she would be bettering her lot if she married this beau or that, and the answer was always no....She never lived but two places in her life, and them a mile apart, but she flew in airplanes to visit Lurt's boy David way out yonder in Hollywood several times, and motored with the folks to visit her sister 'Vider' who married and moved away up in Indiana...And ever chance she got she went to see her sister Annie, who married Eli Winchester and moved on over to West ennessee.. Her fine sense of humor made ' Aunt Eff ' beloved by all. She liked to go places, but was always content to live by herself near her own dear nephew Ottis, where she set and read, crocheted pretties, or pieced nice warm quilts up till the day she came to join Isobel and me...jist barely on the sunny side of 106 years of age. Ottis found her that Spring morning, and he said she had a peaceful smile on her face....The end....... By Jeannie Travis

[Homesteader]

Cute story. Was it written by/about a real person?