Hi everyone, I saw some familiar names and thought I would pass this on. Denah >From: "Sharon Broward Davis" <sadav43@earthlink.net> >Reply-To: "Sharon Broward Davis" <sadav43@earthlink.net> >To: WIREGRASS-L@rootsweb.com >Subject: Civil War Deserters, Coleman's Creek, Appling, Coffee Counites >Date: Thu, 13 Jul 2000 11:01:36 -0400 > >This article is in the BAxley News BAnner and will be included in Vol. 5 >when completed. >Hope someone will find this helpful. > >Sharon Broward Davis >Pine Mtn. Ga. > >Lieutenant Higgs, Mr. Davis, Mr. Summerlin, Mr. Blancett, Mr. Herring, >Manning Kirkland- Thursday, 14 December, 1922 First Editor News-Banner >Writes of Coleman Creek. Encounter Between Deserters and Details of >Appling. Depicts Days of '64. Skirmish Between Provost Guard and Deserters >That Took Place at the Ford of Coleman Creek. Judge Warren P. Ward, of >Douglas, Ordinary of Coffee County, and the first editor of the Baxley >News-Banner back in 1882, has been writing for the Atlanta Sunday >Constitution a series of articles on old times in Wiregrass Country. Last >Sunday he told about the skirmish between the provost guards and deserters >that took place at the ford of Coleman Creek between the Milikin old place >and the Allen Dixon place where Jas. W. Morris now lives. His story is as >follows: > >No people were more patriotic and enthusiastic in the confederate war than >the people of the wiregrass country. Many of them were the sons and >daughters of sturdy stock from Virginia and the Carolinas. Many of them >descendants of veterans of the revolution. Most of them had been reared on >the frontier, others had fought in the Indian wars. They were fighters by >blood and by training. But conditions were all against them and their cause >failed. By the fall, of 1864 the confederacy was falling to pieces. Sherman >had marched through Georgia; had burned Atlanta, and captured Savannah and >many who were at home on furloughs were cut off from their commands and >were compelled to remain at home. Some of them had to bear the ignominy of >being called a "deserter." Many had lost heart and had come home to stay >and take the consequences. While from the beginning of the war a few dared >to remain at home and live in the bushes rather then go to the front. The >confederate government needed! > soldiers and sent details to arrest all deserters issue then got to be >soldier against soldier and trouble began. Several details and deserters >were killed; Among them were Lieutenant Higgs, a detail, killed by a man >named Davis. In short time Davis was killed by the details. A man named >Summerlin was killed by deserters. Blancett and Herring were killed by >detail. A northern man made his appearance in Coffee County, and it was >said, made himself too busy in local matters and soon he was killed. > >In all this time of stress and trouble the ridiculous would appear; I give >you an illustration: "Old Bill Wall," as he called himself, was one of the >fellows who remained at home Benajah Pearson complained that these fellows >were eating his sheep and using his property without leave or license. Old >Bill got word to stop. In reply he sent Mr. Pearson the following lines: > >If it is my choice to stay at home, and the woods in beauty roam; pluck the >flowers in early spring and hear the little songster sing; Why then, should >I, for the sake of gain leave my conscience with a stain. A traitor who >could bear the name with no respect for age or fame; who, for the sake of a >little gold, would have his friends in bondage sold! > >I would rather take the lash than betray them for confederate trash. > >"You say they kill your sheep and cows, you say they take your hogs and >your plows, you say they took your potatoes away, you said they dug your >grave one day. All of this may be true; it makes me sorry for you. > >"Yes sir, if I these men betray and they were all taken away, and they did >not in the battlefield fall, they would then come back and kill "Old Bill >Wall." > >Things got so serious that a company of details was organized in Coffee >County to capture deserters, if possible and restore order in Coffee and >adjoining counties. The company was organized as follows; Silas A. Crosby, >captain; Frank Hall, first lieutenant; Alf Sapp, second lieutenant; Dan >Miles, third lieutenant; Quill Graham, orderly sergeant; Manning Kirkland, >Hiram Ellis, Jack Lott, Neal Curry, William Hinson, Leonard Hinson, William >Mizell, Bill Taylor, Jim Hall, Mr. Higgins, Mr. McLeod, Mr. McCrimmon, Mr. >Deas, L. Merritt, Mr. Carmichael, Thomas Moore and others. > >By this time the deserters were getting to be numerous. They organized for >the purpose of defense. They had signals and signs by which they understood >when there was danger near. One of the saddest tragedies of all the war, in >this section of Georgia, was the killing of Manning Kirkland, a detail, by >the deserters on Coleman's Creek, in Appling County, in the spring of 1865. >A company of details under Captain Crosby was crossing Coleman's Creek at a >point about four miles south of where Surrency, Ga., is now located. The >deserters knew of their coming and had concealed themselves in the creek. >It is said there were more than a hundred deserters in the bunch. There >were not more than twenty-five or thirty details. When they entered the >creek the deserters rose up in mass, and without a word, began firing. The >details cried out, "shoot up, shoot up." but they did not shoot up, they >shot to kill. Several were wounded and several horses killed, but only one >man was killed and th! >at was Manning Kirkland, a brother of Moses, Joshua and Zenus Kirkland, and >also a brother-in-law of Major John M. Spence. This whole section of >Georgia was shocked. Conditions wee terrible and unbearable. It was now >friend against friend and kinsman against kinsman. Mr. Kirkland was buried >at the old Ward Graveyard, where J. M. Tanner now lives on lot of land 664, >seven miles east of Douglas. > > > > > ________________________________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com