Benjamin Batey is a son of Captain William Batey, Revolutionary War Soldier, Rutherford County, Tennessee (L64). This is a huge file; a true wealth of information for anyone interested in Rutherford County, Tennessee. It includes the testimony of many neighbors and former slaves of Benjamin Batey. I copied only a very small portion of the file. I will transcribe verbatim the following record contained within the larger file: Estate of Benjamin Batey vs. the United States Congressional No. 4419 Brief For Claimant On Loyalty This is a claim wherein the Southern Claims Commission held loyalty not proved, because the then evidence was not satisfactory; because the now decedent had two sons in the insurgent army, and because, as a justice of the peace, he presumably took an oath of allegiance to the Confederacy and did disloyal official acts. The evidence on loyalty consists of three depositions taken in 1872 for the Claims Commission, and five taken in 1898 for the Court of Claims. Description of the Witness Batey, Benjamin, claimant, now deceased; 59 when war began; 70 when testified in 1872; large, rich farmer, five miles from Smyrna, Rutherford County, Tenn.; a Whig before war; well-read man, of high reputation and esteem in locality. See page 1 of abstract for testimony. Batey, Thos. R.; grandson of decedent, but not interested because otherwise provided for in will of decedent; orphan inmate of family of decedent before and during war; 11 when war began, and 48 when he testified in 1898. See page 14 of abstract for testimony. Bennett, J. M.; three mile neighbor, intimately acquainted, but not friendly during the war because of quarrel between decedent and father of witness; 31 when war began, and 68 when examined in 1898. See page 10 of abstract for testimony. Brown, Willie; two mile neighbor and long time intimate; 54 when war began; 65 when he testified in 1872, and 90 when he testified again in 1898. See page 3 for first testimony and page 5 of abstract for later testimony. Elder, Joshua W., near neighbor and intimate from of an old time; 63 when war began and 74 when testified in 1872. See page 3 of abstract for testimony. Rowlett, James C.; two mile neighbor and intimate; 33 when war began and 70 when testified in 1898. See page 6 of abstract for testimony. Wilkinson, Geo. H.; clerk of county court, called in 1898 merely to produce and identify some county records relating to justices of peace. The Decedent Before Secession That Batey was a Union man, before actual war and actual secession, is not likely to be disputed in this hearing. That he was an active and talkative anti-secessionist is the tenor of the whole evidence. He lived in Middle Tennessee, which voted strongly against separation in February, 1861. But in June, 1861, the vote in Middle Tennessee was strongly the other way. Wherefore it was possible for decedent to have been one of the majority of Unionists that accepted secession and the war to enforce it, or one of minority of Unionists that remained what they had been. To prove him the latter, he and Brown and Elder testified for the Claims Commission in 1872. Though the Commissioners themselves were responsible for the botched and blotched arrangements they made and maintained for taking testimony in Middle Tennessee until the efficient James Trimble became their deposition Commissioner there, they could not, in good conscience, have found Batey actually and constantly loyal upon the meager and flabby testimony that came up to them from their commissioner, Frazer, and upon which the decedent’s attorney at Washington chose to rest the case. So the claim was properly rejected. To the wretched testimony of 1872 have been added four depositions taken under the rules of this Court, with counsel present for both sides, and now again the question is up, whether Batey went with the majority of Unionists into secession or remained true to the Union throughout. As the abstract into which the whole loyalty evidence has been gathered comes to less than 16 letter-sheet pages of ordinary typewriting, there is no occasion here for elaborate briefing or arguing, since the question might easily be decided from a reading and weighing of the contents of that abstract. Hence, all that will be essayed here is a rapid summary of the things proved by way of reminder. Between The First and Second Votes That Batey voted against separation at the first vote might be assumed from the mere circumstances and without his own statement that he voted with all his might against separation. What happened in Middle Tennessee between the first and second vote is told in Greeley’s “American Conflict.” Vol. 1, page 481. A secret treaty was made between the State authorities and the Confederate government under which all the military resources of the State were turned over to the Confederates, and Middle Tennessee filled with rebel soldiers. Then another popular vote was ordered, which resulted, of course, as had been provided beforehand. At this June election Batey was at the polls, working against a vote for separation, and it is therefore easy to believe his own contemporary statements that he voted against separation. After the State Had Seceded Soon after the State had been taken out of the Union by fraud and violence, a local public meeting was held in the interest of soldiers’ families. At this meeting, old Mr. Bennett, a warm secessionist, publicly denounced Batey for doing nothing for soldiers’ families (Batey being a rich and evidently a spirited man), and, Batey resenting the attack, the two elderly men would have come to blows except for the interference of bystanders. After this, some Confederate soldiers wanted a horse from Batey and, being refused, essayed to take one by force. He defended the entrance to the stable with a double-barreled shot gun, and not being willing to get the horse by killing Batey, and probably having one of themselves killed by him, they gave up the attempt. Some forage and fencing were used by the Confederate forces without the usual tender of payment; some Mississippians made unexecuted threats to take his property, and a detachment wantonly fired their guns into his young apple orchard to spite and anger him. It was after the State seceded and war had began that Batey accused the Democrats of causing the war, which would have been an unnatural and untimely remark if he had gone over to the secessionists. The evidence is that decedent talked all during the war as he had at the beginning. There is not in the record the least proof or intimation that he ever said a word or did an act that tended towards recognition or aid to the rebellion. In that part of the South, a man of his years, position and esteem would, of course, be tolerated by his neighbors, so long as he committed no overt act against their cause, nor became personally abusive. The aged witness, Brown, in 1898, thought decedent voted for separation at the June election, but only because the generality had voted that way, and he was without any knowledge or information of Batey’s vote. The same witness, in 1898, said he did not know how the loyal men regarded Batey, but he also said the neighbors generally did not consider him to be in sympathy with the Confederate cause. The witness thought he had remained loyal to the close of the war, and his account of his conversations with Batey justifies the assumption. The witness Rowlett, in 1898, supposed that Batey sometimes did like himself, and went on to explain that he would sometimes get into a hole and have to crawl out. But he had no knowledge that Batey was ever in a hole or did any crawling, and he is an emphatic witness to the true and constant loyalty of the decedent. The Justiceship of The Peace Decedent was elected in 1860 a justice of the peace and took an oath of allegiance to the Federal Constitution and the Constitution of Tennessee, as shown by the record. His term carried him through the war, and the county court record shows no case of reobligation of an ante-bellum justice. After the State seceded, the oath to the Federal Constitution was omitted in the swearing in of a new justice of the peace, but there was no substitution of an oath to the Confederate Constitution. The person acting as counsel for the defense thought it material to bring out the fact, that the county court records contain no evidence that the decedent ever objected “in open Court,” to the dropping of the oath to the Federal Constitution in the Swearing in of justices after the secession of the State. Considering how favorably the matter stood for Union men, any man who would have imperiled the neighborly arrangement, by raising such an objection as that suggested, would have deserved all he would have gotten from loyal and disloyal for his folly, and more besides. The Court no doubt understands that in Tennessee justices of the peace are numerous and notaries public scarce, except in the large towns. During the civil war, there was no necessary function of a justice of the peace that brought him into relations with, or support of, the rebellion, and the county court records, introduced in evidence, show no county court proceedings in aid of the rebellion. Sons in the Rebel Army The son Tom was of age, and married, and lived away from home, and went into service in 1862. The son John lived at home, but was away from home when he went into the army. The witness Bennett, who once speaks of John as “Zachariah,” thinks he was under age, but John’s nephew, Thomas R. Batey, thinks that John was of age, and decedent himself, in 1872, testified that both John and Thomas were over 21 years old. John Visited home once while in service. A younger son, Benjamin, ran away and enlisted under enticement, and the witness Bennett tells of the father’s anger against those whom he believed responsible for the boy’s act. The whole evidence is to the effect that decedent opposed the entry of the grown sons into the army, and was bitter about the enticing away of the younger son. The evidence also is that decedent did nothing for any of his sons while in service. He had also a son-in-law in the Confederate army, but that is a matter of no present consequence. After The Federals came This part of the story is of no particular importance. It does not appear that decedent did anything for the Federal army, but just to be loyal was all he could do that the well provided army needed. The nearest Federal garrison to decedent was at Lavergne, and there he took the oath of allegiance in April, 1863, and there, on Jan. 24, 1864, he got the loyalist’s privilege to keep a shot gun and a revolver, and there, a month later, he took the newly devised oath of allegiance, extended so as to cover the intended emancipation of slaves. In 1898, his grandson admitted that he did not know which side his grandfather was on while fighting was in progress, but the boy was only 15 years old when the fighting stopped, and therefore only 11 when it began. The Allegation of Bankruptcy In their disallowing report the Claims Commissioners said that claimant was on the list of bankrupts for his judicial district. In truth, he was not; but, despite the war, lived and died an opulent man. The matter is of no further consequence, because the defendants have agreed that the question shall not be raised in the present case. Chas. F. Benjamin Attorney for Claimant Laurel Baty, L252