Dunn General Nelson's Scout

1. Auflage 2016
ISBN: 978-3-7364-0909-5
Verlag: anboco
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark

E-Book, Englisch, 500 Seiten

Throughout the following pages the threads of history and fiction are closely interwoven. The plot of the story is laid in the dark and stormy days of 1861, amid the waving trees and blue grass fields of Central Kentucky. No State wept more bitter tears at the commencement of the dreadful struggle between the North and the South than Kentucky. With loving arms she tried to encircle both, and when she failed, in the language of one of her most eloquent sons, 'So intense was her agony that her great heart burst in twain.' Resolutions of neutrality did little good. Sympathies and beliefs are not controlled by resolutions or laws, and never can be. Kentucky was divided into two great hostile camps. The Secession element was very active, and the Union men saw the State slowly but surely drifting into the arms of the Confederacy. Then it was that Lieutenant William Nelson of the United States navy, a well-known and very[Pg 8] popular Kentuckian, asked the privilege of raising ten regiments of Kentucky troops. The request was granted, and Nelson at once commenced his task. Only a man of iron determination and the highest courage would have dared to undertake such a work. He became the object of the fiercest hatred and opposition,-even from many who professed to love the Union. But he never wavered in his purpose, and established a camp for his recruits at Dick Robinson, a few miles east of Danville. Here it is that the story opens, and Nelson is the chief historic figure-a figure with many imperfections, yet it can be said of him as it was of King James V., in 'The Lady of the Lake': 'On his bold visage middle age Had slightly pressed its signet sage, Yet had not quenched the open truth And fiery vehemence of youth; Forward and frolic glee was there, The will to do, the soul to dare.' All military movements chronicled in the story are historically correct.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Dunn, Byron A.

Leseproben

CHAPTER II.

THE MEETING WITH NELSON.

Never was there a hotter race run in Kentucky. Neck and neck the horses ran, neither seemingly able to gain an inch on the other. The goal grew alarmingly near. Each rider bent over the neck of his flying steed, and urged him on with word and spur. The tree was scarcely twenty yards away. "Now, Prince, if ever," cried Fred. The horse seemed to understand. With a tremendous effort, he plunged forward, and passed the goal half a length ahead.

He plunged forward, and passed the Goal half-a-length ahead.

"Won!" cried Fred, but his huzzah died on his lips. The excitement of the race had made the boys careless, and they ran into a squad of horsemen who were passing along the other road. Fred came nearly unhorsing the leader of the squad, a heavy-set, red-faced man with bushy hair that stood up all around his large head. He was dressed in the uniform of an officer of the United States navy. As for Calhoun, he entirely unhorsed a black groom, who was bringing up the rear of the squad.

The darky scrambled to his feet unhurt, and forgetting his fright in his enthusiasm, shouted: "Golly, massa, dat was a race, suah. Dat a hoss woth habin'." Like a true Kentucky negro, he loved a fine horse, and gloried in a race.

But with the officer, it was different. As soon as he could quiet his horse, he let fly such a volley of oaths that the boys sat on their horses too dumfounded to say a word. The officer swore until he was out of breath, and had to stop from sheer exhaustion.

At the first opportunity, Fred took off his hat and politely said:

"We beg a thousand pardons, sir, but I was racing for the old flag, and had to win, even if I had had to run over the commander-in-chief of the army, instead of a lieutenant of the navy."

"Lieutenant of the navy! lieutenant of the navy!" roared Nelson, for it was he, "I will show you, young man, I command on dry land, as well as on the water," and the air once more grew sulphurous.

"Really," dryly remarked Fred, "if you fight as well as you swear, Kentucky will soon be clear of rebels."

Nelson's companions roared with laughter. As for Nelson, his face twitched for a moment, and then he, too, commenced to laugh.

"It is a good thing for you, young man," he exclaimed, "that you don't belong to the army or I would have you tied up by the thumbs. As it is, will you tell me what you meant by saying that you were racing for the old flag and had to win?"

"Why, sir, my cousin, here, challenged me for a race, saying if he won the South would triumph; but if I won, the old flag would be victorious. So you see, sir, I had to win, even if I had had to run clear over you. You ought to thank me for winning the race, instead of swearing at me for jostling your dignity a little."

Nelson chuckled.

All of this time Calhoun, after soothing his horse, had been a quiet spectator of the scene. He felt nettled over losing the race, and was not in the best of humor.

"So," said Nelson, turning to Calhoun, "you ran for the South to win, did you? Might have known you would have been beaten. What have you got to say for yourself, anyway, you —— little rebel?"

Calhoun's eyes flashed. Drawing himself proudly up, he said: "I am no rebel. I am a Kentuckian, and am for the neutrality of Kentucky."

"Neutrality of Kentucky," sneered Nelson; "of whom did you learn that twaddle, youngster? Neutrality is a plea of cowards to hide their disloyalty."

Calhoun grew deadly pale. He forgot everything in his passion, as he fairly hissed:

"And you are Lieutenant Nelson, are you? That recreant son of Kentucky, who, in spite of her pledge of neutrality, the pledge of a sovereign State, is violating that pledge by raising troops to subjugate a brave and heroic people. You are the Benedict Arnold of Kentucky. If I had my way, you would hang from the nearest tree. Cowards are they who would keep the pledge of neutrality given by the State? You lie, and boy that I am, I hurl defiance in your face," and tearing a riding glove from his hand, he hurled it with all the force he could summon into the face of the astonished Nelson.

For a moment Nelson was speechless with rage; then mechanically he reached for the pistol in his holster. With a sharp exclamation, Fred spurred his horse between the angry man and Calhoun, and striking down Nelson's arm, cried: "How dare you! For shame, to shoot a boy!" Then turning to Calhoun, he gave the sharp command, "Go! go at once!"

Calhoun obeyed, and boy and horse were off like a shot; without a word of apology, Fred followed. Nelson made a movement as if to pursue, but at once reined up his horse. The look of anger soon passed from his face; he began to chuckle, and then to laugh.

Turning to one of his staff, he exclaimed: "Gad! Lieutenant, I came nearly forgetting myself and shooting that boy. It would have been an outrage. He has the grit, the true Kentucky grit. I am proud of both of those boys. I shall keep my eye on them. What soldiers they would make!"

Such was General William Nelson, fiery, erratic, and oftentimes cruel, but at all times ready to acknowledge true courage and manliness in his worst enemy. To him, more than to any other one man, does the government owe the fact that Kentucky was saved to the Union. In the face of the fiercest opposition he never faltered in his purpose of raising troops, and the most direful threats only nerved him to greater exertion.

The two boys looking back, and seeing that they were not pursued, brought their horses to a trot and began to talk of their adventure.

"Fred," said Calhoun, "you are the first to get in your work on that oath. I believe the brute would have shot me if it had not been for you."

"You certainly gave him great provocation, Cal. It was very ungentlemanly in him to attack you, a boy, as he did, but these are war times. My! but you did go for him, Cal; you really looked grand in your fiery indignation. I could not help admiring you, even if you were foolish. It is a wonder he did not shoot you, for Nelson is a man of ungovernable temper when aroused."

"He would have shot me, Fred, if it had not been for your brave interference. Come to think about it, I could not blame him much, if he had shot me; for I could not have offered him a greater insult than I did. I was hasty and excited; you were cool and collected. Fred, I thank you."

"No more of that, my boy. But, Cal, try and govern your tongue. Your hasty speech and temper will get you in serious trouble yet."

"I gave the villain no more than he deserved. There is no other man in Kentucky doing as much as Nelson to overthrow the sovereignty of the State; there is no other man doing as much to array one portion of our people against the rest; and if bloodshed comes, no man will be more to blame than he. He should be arrested and hanged as a traitor to Kentucky, and I am glad I told him so."

"Calhoun," answered Fred, "you have heard neutrality talked so much you are blind to the real facts. Nelson was right when he said neutrality was but a blind for secession. If Kentucky is saved to the Union, it will be saved by the efforts of such men as he. There can be no middle ground; you must be for or against the Union."

"I confess," answered Calhoun, "while I have been talking neutrality, my real sympathy has been with the South. Down with coercion, I say, and death to all renegades like Nelson."

Fred smiled. "How about renegades like myself, Cal? But I am glad to hear you expressing your true sentiments; it shows you are honest in them, at least."

"Fred, why can't you think as I do? You are too honest, too brave, to side with Abolitionists and mudsills. They are a dirty, low, mischievous set, to say the least. There can be but one issue to the war. The whole dirty crew will run like cravens before the chivalric gentlemen of the South."

"Don't be too sanguine, Cal, about the running. Do you think such men as Nelson, Fry, Bramlette, Woodford, and a host of others I might name, are cowards?"

"Oh! I didn't mean the few Kentuckians who are espousing the Union cause, but the riff-raff and scum of the North."

"You will find the men you call the 'riff-raff and scum of the North,' are just as earnest, just as brave, as the sons of the South."

"Do you think so?"

"Why not? Are we not of the same blood, the same language? This idea that the people of the South are a superior race to the people of the North is one simply born of our pride and arrogance. But you ask me why I side with the North. Because the North battles for the old flag; because it loves freedom. Cal, do you think a just God will ever let a Confederacy be successful whose chief corner-stone is human slavery?"

Calhoun flushed and muttered: "They are nothing but niggers, and the Bible upholds slavery."

"We will not argue that. My great-grandfather on my mother's side fell on Bunker Hill. Our great-grandfather fought at Yorktown; our grandfather was with Jackson at New Orleans. All fought under the old flag; all fought for freedom, not for slavery....