Weekly Trinity journal. [volume] (Weaverville, Calif.) 1857-1972, 1864-05-28
NUMBER 90.
The Bushwhackers.
A correspondent of ST. Louis paper thu
the bushwhacker

| A correspondent of ST. Louis paper thus
paragraphs the bushwhacker
" 1t would require an artist of supsrlatiye
skill to paint to you the bushwhacker as he is
He comes from the dregs of degraded popula-
ton. He cannot write his name. His speech is
mixture of falsehoods and impudence expressed
in the worst English spoken by white men, and
apparently culed from the corruptious of planta-
ton slang. He belongs to a gang of from five
to forty in number. His family occupy cabin
remote from the highway; or the families of
several throng together and occupy the large
house by the wayside, of some absconded rebel.
He never owned niger but he may have been
nigger-drver on some neighboring plantation
He has sandy complexion has for whiskers
number of struggling dirt colored hairs that
grow straight downward he seldom washes his
hands or changes his shirt. He visits his wife,
n woman as dirty and ignorant himself, and
who chews tobacco and dips snuff, as often as it
is safe for him to do it the balance of the time
he spends in the brush or in committing rob-
berries unprotected Union families. He has a
leader little more intelligent and little more
daring than himself. Ten of them dare not at
tack three armed soldiers, but five will so to the
house of man who has a little money and tor
ture him by setting him on live Goals of fire, or
pulling out his toe-nails with bullet-moulds, till
he tells them where his treasure is concealed
and the robbery completed they retire to their
est-a shoat which lives half wild in the woods
which is lank, poor and runs like deer, which
is brought down by rife shot, badly dressed,
boiled to rags and eaten fresh, with little corn
bread. He has half dozen dogs, and as many
dirty, tow-headed children, lives in wretched-
ness, squalor and crime. But he is good judge
of a horse, and has superior in speed and
bottom to those of any of his pursuers, and it
is often of the best Kentucky or Louisiana blood.
All seasons are aliketo him, but his more daring
feats performed when the leaves on the
trees, and effectually hide the approaches to the
thicket in some ravine which is his hiding place
His arms are big knife, one or two navy re-
volveys, and rife or shotgun, possibly a
carbine captured from some Struggling soldier
whom he had murdered and stripped. His origi-
nal uniform is, of course, ragged suit of but
ternut but he often has a blue coat or
pants, the spoil of some unusual and fendsh
butchery. He obtains ammunition through some
neighbor, who visits provost marshal, says he
was always loyal, takes the oath and obtains
permit to carry arms, including, of course, the
right to buy powder and lead. When the Fed
eral army is in the vicinity, he may be seen
planting in the day time-at night he will
be shooting the pickets. If his house is visited,
and his wife asked where he is, the uniform an
swer is, =. have no husband or, he has gone
South, or, o, he is with your'ns,' intmating
that he is in the Federal army And she is so
ready with the lie that she often names the COM
mand to which she says he belongs, and states
where il is stationed. He owes allegiance to no
Government is bound by no laws is a common
bandit and robber, with no sentiment of chivalry
to make his adventures romantic no notions OF
valor intelligence; no generosity to divide
him from other beasts of prey If this cruel
is over, he will still, for his life time, haunt
the scenes of his depredations, and walk amid
the rude graves of his victims his gang will de-
fy the law and its minions he will be the
curse the curse to kill with which the re-
bellion invoked and till his generation pass away
he will be the terror to neighborhood quiet and
the foe to civil Government