Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1897-04-02
CAPTAIN HALLER.

CAPTAIN HALLEK.
They made anything but a warlike ap.
pearance, these four old Zine officers"
who sat at a little table in the snug corner
of a cafe near the Army building in White
hall street. comfortably slipping their tod
dy, smoking and talking over the old
times, but every one of them had smelled
powder and heard the scream of shells,
and they were living over again the days
of their service in the field through the
tales that each one told.
"You will find, " said Captain Havelock,
a white haired veteran, who had served
through the war of the rebellion and
nearly a score of the Indian campaigns fol-
lowing it, lone entry among those in the
large army register which runs as follows
." Halter, George. Born in Prussia, APP
pointed from army second lieutenant Fiji
tcenth infantry, 23d December, 1864; first
lieutenant. 23d December, 1864. Trans
ferrcd to Twenty fourth infantry 21st Sep.
TENDER, 1866; captain, 10th July, 1868.
Transferred to Eleventh infantry 25th
April, 1869. Died Sth June, 1859
cit is like many another entry in that
register, which Cmbrdccs the names of all
officers who have ever held regular COM
missions. And you may wonder how it is
that l remember it all so distinctly.
will tell you.
Here the old soldier paused, blew a cloud
of smoke from his cigar toward the cell
ing looked around the table at the other
old veterans who had just listened to a
story from Lieutenant -- of the kill
ing of Black Bill Bickersteth, a Texan
desDeradO and then went on
" Died Sth June, 1862 SO the register
says, but this may or may not be correct
No one so far as l know is alive now to
tell just where George Haller did die.
myself fixed the date in the register from
the best evidence l could collect, but that
is all. do know this, however, that after
serving gallant and meritorious' four
years, rising from the ranks to a captaincy,
George Halter one of the bravest, truest
men that ever fought under the flag, was
dragged to death at the heels of horses by
fiends in human guise. The mystery of
his death WIS never wholly laid bare, but
parts of it were disclosed, and his whitened
bones were brought to my quarters in a
gunny sack. But, Lord bless me, am
pulling the trigger ahead of time. l have
never told the story before, and the cir
oumstances are known to few besides my
self
Like Lieutenant --, l was one of
the unfortunate devils exiled to Texas
shortly after the close of the war and was
sent with my cOmpany-l was a captain,
then, just promoted-to the capital Aus
tin. We were campcd iii tents on bluff
outside the town, overlooking the Colo
RADIO river, and had large post-that is,
our force consisted of half n dozen troops
of cavalry and eight companies of infantry,
the idea being that in case of trouble in
the surrounding country we could send
out detachmcnts sufficiently large to put
a stop to it. There was trouble enough,
the Lord knows-horsc stealing, cattle
stampeding, plundcrings, murders and
what not So that we had our hands full
most of the time
About IA month after we had estab-
lished our garrison-that is, about the
middle of May, 1869, one day there limped
into camp distressed looking negro with
blistered feet and haunted expression of
face that was pitiable
Fo' de good Lo'ds sake, he pleaded
with our commander, sen ev'ry Union
man yo' alls got hyar up to Camcr'n. Gus
Lightfoot an his n is done MURDERED ey'y
niger in Milan county.
"Not to trouble you with the varied de,
tails Of the darky's story told in the pc
culiar dialect Of the race and plentifully
intersrcrsed with prayers and oaths i'm
partially distributed, we learned from him
that Gus Lightfoot, daring young des'
perado, who had for some time terrorized
Milan county just as the lieutenant 5
friend Bickersteth did McClemnan, had
only the Sunday previous perpetrated pc
4
ed a wholesale butchery of defenseless ne
groes at Cameron aided by dozen choice
spirits, which he had gathered about him.
"This butchery, according to our sable
friend, had taken place while the little
Methodist church in the village was crowd
ed with blacks who had gathered to attend
the funeral of one of their number. Light
foot had arranged his plans Systematically
for while the services were in progress one
of his gang had fastened the church door
to prevent exit, and the others had taken
up positions at the windows, thus COM
manding the interior.
son signal the entire band began
emptying their revolvers into the terror
stricken mourners, causing an indescrib-
able scene Some 20, the courier said, had
been shot to death, men and women, and
as many more wounded. He himself had
escaped from the church, leaving his wife's
dead body lying there, where it might bS
yet for all he knew. He had walked day
I and night until he had reached Austin
I where he had heard there were soldiers
and that was Il except that he assured Us
| that all the blacks in the country would
need burying If we did not hurry men &c
| the scene.
"While the story impressed us we could
hardly credit the facts-we were new tC
Texas then. SO it was not deemed neces
sary TO send force of men to Cameron
which lay some 90 miles northeast of us
until more was learned. Some were fol
sending part IF company or small de