Henry Lane Stone

“ No man can fully or correctly appreciate the value of personal liberty who has never been a prisoner. At least three-fourths of Morgan’s men felt what it was to endure the fearful life of a Northern military prison, and many of them were humiliated by incarceration in the loathsome dungeons and cells of penitentiaries while prisoners of war. Fortunately for me, I escaped from Camp Douglas in time to avoid the starvation policy subsequently inaugurated there, which was said to have been enforced by way of retaliation for the treatment Federal prisoners received at Andersonville, Ga. ”

“ We should not content ourselves with the victories and honors of the past. The present and future have demands upon us. The welfare of our respective communities and States, as well as of our common country, calls for our continued labors in their behalf.
I shall always remember a remark made by my friend, Jerry R. Morton, of Lexington (one of Morgan’s men, and, for many years after the war, Circuit Judge of that district) , who has passed on ahead of us, one day while we were in Canada together. ”

“ There is no tie of friendship so strong and lasting as that wrought by a common service among soldiers engaged in a common cause. Time and distance are powerless to sever such a tie or to erase from memory the vivid recollections of dangers encountered and hardships endured. ”

“ There was hardly a neighborhood in Kentucky in which there did not reside after the war closed one or more ex-Confederate soldiers, while many became useful and honored citizens of other States. Coming out of the army, most of them ragged and poor, some of them crippled for life, with no Government pension to depend upon, they went to work for a living, and their labors have not gone unrewarded. ”

“ The same restless, daring spirit that actuated Morgan’s men in the field characterized them in prison, and out of eighteen hundred prisoners taken on the Indiana and Ohio raid not less than six hundred of them escaped from Camps Morton and Douglas. I have heard that one of the Chicago newspapers stated during the war that even if Morgan’s men had done nothing to distinguish them before their capture on the raid through Indiana and Ohio, they had immortalized themselves by their wonderfully successful escapes from prison. ”

“ The hardship is mine. I do not build much on all this, and yet if a regular system of petition was gotten up by many influential parties at once the President might yield. I wish that my friends by a concerted movement, combined with the Archbishops of Ohio and Missouri, R. C., would petition His Excellency. Bishop Quintard, of Tennessee, would, I am convinced, willingly help an old friend and comrade. But, alas! I am in prison and can combine nothing. ”

“ Henry L. Stone remains with us, vigorous in body, keen in mind, always ready to fight, and fight hard, for a good cause, an ornament to the bar and a splendid specimen of that splendid manhood that the soldiers of the Confederacy furnished a reunited country. ”

“ Hanson’s men and his own, and declared he would shoot down the first one of his own men who molested a prisoner. And here I may venture the assertion that no officer in either army, as far as my knowledge extends, was kinder to prisoners or more considerate of their rights than Gen. Morgan.
When our command crossed the Ohio River at Brandenburg, in two steamboats we had captured, I experienced some peculiar sensations as I set foot on Indiana soil and realized that I was engaged in a hostile invasion of my adopted State. ”

“ Just before entering Paris, I saw two guards in Federal uniform, and “Wash” told me there was difficulty in getting passes out of Paris, and it was right difficult to get into Paris. As soon as I saw these soldiers—I had to make up my mind quickly—I addressed them first, before they had time to say or do anything. I said “See here, gentlemen, I have got a boy here with me that is going to take my horse back. I am going to Cincinnati with stock, and I want to know if he will need a pass to get out?” One of the guards answered “No, that will be all right. ”

“ A learned physician, Dr. Mudd, has descended to playing the fiddle for drunken soldiers to dance to or form part of a very miserable orchestra at a still more miserable theatrical performance. Wonders never cease, but my paper does; so I will simply wish you a happy New Year and subscribe myself your sincere friend,
G. St. L. Grenfell.
Some time after this letter was written, how long I do not remember, Col. Grenfell undertook to make his escape from the Dry Tortugas in a small boat on a stormy night, hoping to be able to reach the Cuban coast, but was never heard of afterward. ”

“ The crossing of our twenty-four hundred men and horses was effected by unsaddling and driving the horses into the swollen stream, twenty or thirty at a time, and letting them swim to the opposite bank, where they were caught and hitched, while the men went over in two flat-boats and a couple of indifferent canoes. ”

“ While at the hotel that night, a young man came to my room and that of Hon. John [6] D. Young, who was the Democratic candidate for Congress and traveling with me, and he told us all about the fight of Col. Duke, what a bloody affair it was, and how the people had noticed a young man a few days before passing through Augusta and going to Sunday-school, and they attributed Duke’s plans to that young man’s story of how conditions were in Augusta; in other words, that he had acted as a spy for Duke. I said, “Young man, you are mistaken about that matter and your people are mistaken. ”

“ Wheeler, as we followed in the path of desolation left by Sherman’s army, we were daily engaged with Gen. Kilpatrick’s cavalry, and for eight days were without bread or meat, living on sweet potatoes alone, the only food left from destruction by the Federal troops. The first meat we ate after this fast was some fresh beef, which we found in a camp from which we had just driven the enemy before they had had time to cook and eat it. ”

“ I rode to Augusta, Ga., with Lieut. William Messick, who was from Danville, Ky., and there I surrendered to the 18th Indiana Infantry Regiment, then occupying the city, and received my parole May 9, 1865. [22]
Before we were disbanded at Washington, Ga., the remnants of the funds of the Confederate States, in specie, that had been hauled by wagons through from Richmond, was distributed among the troops at that time. I remember the men of our brigade got $26.00 a piece. Most of it was in Mexican dollars, silver money. I brought it home with me. ”

“ A few days later, finding no opportunity to get South, owing to the presence of Federal troops in Eastern Kentucky, with the aid of friends I got on the train at Paris, Ky., and went to Canada via Cincinnati, [17] Toledo, and Detroit. I went from the house of a friend, residing near Mt. Sterling. A colored boy about eighteen years old named “Wash,” was sent with me to Paris. We rode horse-back, and he was to take my horse back. He knew I was a Confederate soldier, but he was faithful to his trust. He afterward joined the Federal army. ”

“ Lake Erie froze over from side to side so thick as to allow heavy teams to cross over it a distance of forty miles. Some Confederate prisoners who were confined at Johnson’s Island made their escape on the ice to Canada. One of these in making his escape was wounded by the Federal guard and was taken to a farmhouse near Kingsville. Everybody skated in that country, and I soon learned the sport. ”

“ I got on the train from the East as it slowed up and came into Windsor. I do not recall whether it was a Grand Trunk train or the Canadian Pacific, but at any rate I got off the train before we reached the depot, and some detective evidently saw me. ”

“ Smith and Marshall, I put aside the study of law, bade farewell to my parents, and left Indiana to join the Confederate army. I came to Cincinnati while it was under martial law, passed the pickets above the city, in a countryman’s market wagon, took a boat at New Richmond, Ohio, and landed on a Sunday morning at Augusta, Ky. That day I attended Sunday-school in Augusta, and walked to Milton, in Bracken County, where I stayed all night. The next day I reached Cynthiana, and found there the first confederate soldiers I ever saw, being a portion of Morgan’s Men under Col. ”

“ Charles Hanson’s infantry regiment, the 20th Kentucky, into the brick depot at Lebanon, Ky. Our troops surrounded the building, but were greatly exposed to the enemy’s fire, and suffered under the heat of a broiling sun for four hours. Some of our men concealed themselves by lying down in or behind the tents just vacated by the Federal troops. When the order was given by Gen. Morgan to charge the enemy, I witnessed an admirable exhibition of courage on the part of Col. ”

“ Col. Grenfell, having had large experience with this dreadful disease, faithfully nursed all who were stricken down among the garrison as well as other prisoners. My brother’s wife was one of the first victims. After her death, my brother started North with his little three-year-old boy, but, was taken ill of yellow fever while aboard the vessel, and died at Key West. In a letter written by Col. Grenfell the next day, in which he gave me an account of my brother’s death, he stated ”