The Wellington enterprise. [volume] (Wellington, Ohio) 1899-1900, 1899-07-05
FAIR PRISONERS OF WAR.
An Unrecorded Incident Of the Civn
War That Was Humorous
and Romantic.


II was mixed up in one little unre-
corded event of the civil war;" said Gen.
B., ''that was interesting from its
very unusuainess, and which as look
back upon it, seems strangely pictur-
esque. We were attached TO what was
known as the Marine brigadcs n little
fleet of 12 "tin-clad" river steamers that
piled up and down the Mississippi after
the surrender of Vicksburg. The term
"tin-clad," by the way, is somewhat
misleading, as it is not remotely con-
nected with the white metal, but signi-
tles rather boats heavily planked with
oak for the purpose of protecting them
somewhat from the ravages of bullets.
"One day our little battalion of four
companies was ordered to steam down
the river, disembark at Rodney, march
to Fort Gibson, and there consult
sealed orders in regard to further pro-
ceedings. Imagine our surprise upon
reading the instructions to find that
we were expected to capture and carry
to Vicksburg as prisoners so of the most
aristocratic confederate young women
in the city. However, we had served
long enough to obey orders without
question, and provided with guides ia
miliar with the town, we set about our
bizarre and not too agreeable task. We
first established headquarters at the
residence of a prominent confederate
Judge. Then different squads were sent
out to call at the homes of the young
women and escort them to the place of
rendezvous. The instructions were
that they were to report at headquar-
ters within two hours on penalty of
their family residence beipg burned to
the ground. The only information we
could give them (the whole transaction
was as much mystery to us as to
them) was that they were to be taken
to Vicksburg as prisoners of war, but
were on no account to suffer any dis
comfort or indignity.
OF course, there was great weeping,
wailing and gnashing of teeth from
tender mothers, loving sisters, and irate
fathers and brothers. But the incident
had to be accepted as belonging to the
fortunes of war, and at the end of two
hours 40 of the so, attended by anxious
friends and relatives, were at the rem
devious. Mercy was implored for the
one delinquent. An additional hour
was granted, and at their own sugges-
ton several of the young women were
dispatched to her home to persuade her
to follow their example in gracefully
submitting to the inevitable. The re-
suit was that before the hour was up,
the last fair prisoner put in an appear
ance, though in very defiant mood.
Our troubles, however, by no means
ended here. Indeed, they were hard
ly fairly begun. The next question was
how to transport our beautiful captives
to Rodney, distance of some 20 miles,
over roads that were in frightful con-
dition from deyastations of war and
consequent neglect. All the good
horses, too, like all the good men, were
off to the war, and as for carriages,
they had most decidedly fallen into a
state of innocuous desuetude. There
was obviously nothing for us to do,
therefore, but to gather together all
the broken-down old horses and dilapi-
dated vehicles in the vicinity, which we
somehow managed to hitch together
with plow harnesses, bits of rope
: straps, etc. With these improvised
coaches drawn up into line, began the