The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1891-06-18
BILL ARP'S CHAT.
Itiania Constitution.

am going III Searcn OF llDerIy.
Twenty-six years ago about this time the
old soldiers we're dropping in upon their
old homes-some on foot and some on old
army mules that were too poor to utter
decent bray. These old veterans were 80
changed that their wives and mothers
hardly knew them. Unshaved, unshod,
unwashed, ragged and tired they were
pitiful contrast to their own pictures when
they first went forth to war. If it were
not sad it would be funny to say that they
reminded US of Falstaf, who said of his
soldiers! "There's not shirt and half
in all my company As thes dropped in
On the old homesteads most of them found
somebody dead-a mother, wife, a sis
ter, OF perhaps child-and the poor fell
Low would sit in the old plit.bottbmed
chair and listen and Sigh as tie tale of
sorrow WAS rehearsed. There is more of
tender, touching reality about the return
of the veterans to their humble, desolated
homes than will ever be told in history.
Within the limits of the Sherman belt
they found nothing as they left it. There
were no horses or mules or cattle OF hogs.
The fences had been burned-the once
happy fields we're growing up in weeds
and briars. The tires were off the wagon
wheels, the plows worn out, the corncrib
empty, the bagging had rotted off the cot.
ton bales that had been packed three
years before. A bushel of corn was q
granary, and was kept hidden from the
deserters and robbers of both armies, who
infested the country. Crumbling walls
and lonesome chimneys marked the home
of those who fed before the march of the
foul invader. But there were thousands
of the old and helpless and the widows
and orphans who had tostay, for they had
nowhere to go and nothing to 60 in.
Many of them were like Cobe says he
was: "Had nothin' and nothin' to get
nothin' With and nothin' to put it in"
and when he moved from one place to
another he started his wife and children
ahead in drove, and then he put out
the fire and called the dog and followed
them.
But these war worn soldiers were al
ready hardened to toll and trouble. They
smiled at peace and poverty, and comfort
ed their families with love and hope and
determination. No more was heard the
midnight order, to get up and march. No
more the rattling of musketry or the
booming of cannon. No more the famil-
lar news that "old Bob Lee had whipped
'em again" These soldiers went to work.
1t did not take long to make an inventory
of what was left. There WAS no corn for
the mules, but there was grass. What
they would do for bread was the most &C.
rious question, for they had no money.
There was none in the country except
Confederate, and bushel of that would
not buy bushel of potatoes. For two or
three months they had struggled along,
and divided out their substance and lived !;
yes, lived and sometimes laughed and told
an army joke, or sickly. measly anec-
dote on old Bob, or old Tige, or old Rock.
But slowly and surely the supply of hid
den corn was giving out. Lean and hun.
cry fingers we're scratching the bottom of
the sack, when all of sudden-yes, just
in the nick of time I received letter, a
good, kind, sympathetic letter that had
come 1000 miles, and in it was check
"a bank check for s3,0O0-s3, 900 in
greenbacks, and it was to buy corn for the
poor who lived in the fiery belt-that let
ter came from Liberty, away up in Mis-
souri,, north of Kansas City. 1t was to us
an amazing charity. There was not S1OO
nor 100 bushels of corn within fifty miles
of us. The letter gave US the names of
good men in St. Louis who would send us
the corn without commission, and We or
dered it at once and divided it out with
FIVE counties and put good old Tom Perry
in charge of it. Rome vas our Egypt.
and Tom was our Joseph, and they came
every day to get their share. Poor con-
federate widows walked for miles with
their little sacks; wagons were patched
up and hauled for settlement. There
was no leakage or ratage or stealing. The
corn was bought at IS cents bushel, and
the freight vas put at half price. What
glorious gift was that. But where waa
Liberty, and what kind of people lived
there, and how did they hear Of our des.
titution? That was the question. Fol
four long years our soldier boys had been
fighting for liberty and failed to find it,
and now in our despair and desolation
Liberty had found us and laid her treas
ures at our feet.
And 80 I am going in search Of Liber-
ty. They have a college there-a time
honored institution, and the young men
have called me to come and dispense my
wit and wisdom and I am going. Our
people owe Liberty debt and the inter.
est has been running for twenty.six years.
and all they ask is an hours talk to the
boys.
I remember we'll the glad surprise
when that check came, and a few days
after newspaper from Liberty that told
how their people had heard of the desti-
tuition that was in the wake of the march
to the sea, and how gladly and generously
they raised $4,000 and scattered it along
the line. To whom shall we send North
Georgia's portion was the next question,
and crippled veteran by the name Of
McCarty, an Irishman, who had followed
Sterling Price as long as he had two legs,
rose up and said: Gentlemen, I don't
know but one man there, and his name is
Arp, and I've been reading Of his letters