The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1896-05-13
Breathed Smoke Of War.

ud.luS loAN
Gus on two continents.
For four years Mrs. Forsythe lived
under the smoke of the cannon, being
a soldiers wife who went through the
entire war with her husband. Thrice
welded and thrice widow d, twice the
mother of a posthumous child and
again on The last day of the war left
desolate with a tiny babe in her arms,
her experience as wife and mother,
says the Chicago News, is almost up-
precedented.
After the death of her first husband,
Calvin McClung, she married Gen. A:
P. Hill, one of the most distinguished
generals in the Confederate army, a
man whose name was on the dying
lips Of Stonewall Jackson and Robert
E. Lee. AS a bride she went to the
front with her husband and was actively
interested in his company, the Irwin
cibles, 18th Virginia, Among other
things she presented the company with
a handsome silk flag, but during an
engagement the color-bearer arm was
shot eff, and the flag, gripped in the
bloody hand, was captured by a Union
soldier. Mrs. hill promptly made IN
other AMI it is now hanging in the
White House at Richmond. Gen.
Hill was killed the last day of the war
at the fall of Petersburg. Gen: Lee
made a charge and recovered his body,
and q few moments after the general
had parted from his wife he was brought
back to her, shot through the heart,
his wedding ring still on his finger and
his cape covering his dead face.
That night the army retreated in
haste and Mrs. Hill was the last woman
to pass the pontoon at Petersburg. 1t
was an awful journey, for the roads
we're choked with the disorganized
troops sometimes they were in the
enemy's lines and again in their own,
but all through that dreadful night
Mrs. Hill sat in the ambulance by her
dead husbands body, holding her
baby and little daughter in her arms.
She buried Gen. Hill at Gouchland,
Va, laying him away in the uniform
he wore when he fell. Afterward the
body was removed to Hollywood, but
a few years ago Mayor Ginter donated
the spoti in Richmond where Gen. Hill
organized his first company, and MS
body was taken there and a splendid
monument erected to his memory.
His youngest daughter, Miss Lucy
Lee Hill, the babe of the retreatiDg
army is now a beautiful woman and
was one Of the board of lady managers
at the Worlds Fair from Kentucky.
She is Gen. Lees god-daughter, and
his tears fell on her baby face as he
held her in his arms at the baptismal
font.
Some years after Gen. Hills death
Mrs. Hill married DR.. Alexander For
sythe. Since his death she came to
Chicago and now resides at 1Ol Pine
street. She was a noted beauty in
her youth ard her cordiality endears
her to friends new and old. The home
life of the Morgan family was singu-
larly happy, for there were six sons
and six daughters to fill the hospitable
home with merrymaking. Gen. Nor
gan was the eldest child. He was
p~assionately fond of children and Mrs.
Forsythe says that OIL Sunday morn.
ings he used to take a quantity Of
bread and an immense bright tin pan
full of molasses and gather all the
! plantation p%icaninnies on the lawn
and let them "sop" the sweet stuff to
their hearts content. In the winter
the poor, both black and white, had
the freedom of his great wood yard
back of his factory.
The betrayal and death of Gen.
| Morgan are never mentioned in the
| family circles, and the narrowing de-
tails were carefully withheld from the
grief-stricken mother. The general
was en- his way to visit his wife, to
whom he had not long been married.
| Worn with travel, he stopped for the
night at a lonely farm house. The
people were ardent Southern sympa-
thizers and personal friends, but the
daughter had a sweetheart in the
| Union army. After the family retired
she stole out, saddled horse and rode
to the nearest camp with the startling
news that Gen. Morgan was asleep at
her mothers home. AS the night
was wild and stormy and his retreat
! obscure, Gen. Morgan felt perfectly
secure and slept soundly until a
movement in the yard aroused him.
He sprang out of bed and rushed out
of the house in his night clothes. He
was Immediately surrounded and shot.
Before his heart ceased beating his
unclothed body was flung across a
horse and taken to camp. On the way
the country was aroused by the SOL
diers' exultant cries.:
"We have killed Morgan, the great
Confederate rebelI'
It is a matter of history that from
the girl who betrayed him to the men
who shot him every one has suffered a
violent death. Mrs. Forsythe' young
est brother, Francis Key Morgan,
named after his cousin, author of "The
Star-spargled Banner" inherited the
fearless spirit. When Il he climbed
into the cupola of the old academy at
Lexington and unfurled the Confeder-
ate flag. The city swarmed with Union
soldiers and it would have gone hard
for the lad had he not been spirited
away in a closed carriage. About this
time Gen. Morgan sent a trusty Irish
bow with letters to his mother. His