The Austin weekly statesman. (Austin, Tex.) 1883-1898, 1886-05-13

The house, which had been destroyed dur
ing the battle, had since been rebuilt in a very
substantial manner of brick. The pictures
accompanying this sketch were made from
photographs by j. X. Graeme, photogra
pher, Fredericksburg, Va.
In 1888 the house was tenanted by one Bob
Oliver, a native Of the vicinity. He was a
man of about 55 or 60 years of age, and to-
gether with his son, a young man of about
80, and with the help of negro carried on
the farm. They proved to be very pleasant
people and in the two days I stayed with
them received from them nothing but kind
ness and in the evening, sitting on the porch
l listened to his stories of war times with
much pleasure For some reason or other
Bob had not been in the army, but ran a
small farm five or six miles from Chancel-
louisville, and judging from the accounts of
Bob and his good wife, they had rather a
lively time of it. If he is to be believed the
Confederates were even worse thieves than
the Yankees-anything in the shape of
green corn or the contents of the smokehouse
was considered fair game, and a horse
was not safe even in the cellar of a dwelling
house. During the last year of the war this
section of the country was more or less ex-
posed to the raiding of both parties. The in
habitants were obliged to give up even the
pretense of raising a crop and to depend
upon luck for the means of keeping body and
soul together.
All this reminds me that no matter how
carefully a man may have been reared-no
matter how much trouble may have been
taken to instill into his mind proper re-
gard for the property rights of others-once
let him get uniform coat ON his back, and
be seems to lose all conception of meum and
teun, and to have no more scruples about con-
fiscating a chicken, an armful of corn, hog,
or even horse, than a cat would have over
dining off pet canary bird. / know man
now living at Hyde Park who stole black
smiths heavy hammer, and the most
notorious forager l ever knew was the
son of an Episcopal clergyman of Boston,
and BESIDES l confess, that like the man who
was warning his son of the evil results of
card playing, | speak from experience The
general features of the battlefield are about
the same as in 1868. The grounds about the
bouse, and the opening on the south side of
the plank road in the direction of Hazel
grove, are still open and devoted to agricul-
ture, and what was forest on the day of the
are of kind valuable for timber, but few
have been cut and those principally white
oaks for railroad ties, and with the exception
of few places where the young growth has
crept out into the open, there is no difficulty
in recognizing localities OF course, the chief
point of interest to me was the position occu-
pied by Carr's-formerly Grovers-brigade,
to which belonged, to the right of the plank
road, and short distance into the woods /
readily found the spot where | was captured
The two saplings between which
had twisted the barrel of my mus
ket when capture became certain, had
grown to be as large as my thigh;
the ground about was still strewn with such
of the debris as was not quickly perishable,
such as belt plates, buttons and the other
iron portions of soldiers kit, and under the
fallen leaves found more than fifty bullets
in search OF less than ten minutes. A short
distance in front of the position held by the
First Massachusetts, regiment there is a! wood
road leading on to the right and in the angle
of the two roads stands bowlder about Al
feet high; its other dimensions are about 81