126 Nortu Caroxina Troops, 1861-’65.

of many hair-breadth escapes and blood-curdling stories of
his cavalry company in East Tennessee in Sevier, Blount, Me-
Minn and Polk Counties

Sergeant A. Lon. Welch, of Company A (Anderson, S. C.)
can also relate many thrilling adventures of those dark days.
Mr. Welch is now a prosperous man in his South Carolina
home.

Captain Cam. Taylor, of Company I, is a leading lawyer
among the Cherokee Indians in the West at Tah-le-quah (cap-
ital of the nation), where quite a number of his Indian breth-
ren followed him (he is part Cherokee). Captain Sou-ate-
Owle, of Company A, now of Cherokee, N. C., and com
mander of “‘Saw-noo-kee” Camp No. 1268, is still living at his
Swain County home near Cherokee P. O. He was a brave
warrior. He and twenty of his command attended the Louis-
ville reunion and attracted a good deal of notice. He is a
Baptist. preacher.

In the midst of these stormy days Colonel Walker finally
went home, near Murphy, sick. He was called to the door
and shot down like a dog. Following this tragedy there was
much apprehension among officers and men. Burnside’s
army having all lower East Tennessee in its iron grasp, there
was little that this regiment, divided up as it was, could
do but stand sentinel and defend their homes and the homes
of their comrades of the Twenty-ninth, Thirty-ninth, Twenty-
fifth and Sixty-ninth Regiments, and they did their duty well
and faithfully under great danger and privation. The win-
ter of 1863-64 was unusually severe, the snows were deep and
numerous, but wood was plenty.

Another great service performed by these men was the re-
capture of 250 Federal prisoners who escaped from down
South in squads of five to fifteen. This was largely done by
the Cherokee Indians, who were familiar with every footpath
in the mountains and could follow the trial of a man or party
when all signs had failed to others.

Many Yankee soldiers, after escaping from Columbia,
ete., were picked up and sent back. These Indians were
never cruel to prisoners or any one else, but were faithful
“sentinels” on the “watch tower.” One faithful fellow on an

EIGHTIETH REGIMENT. 127

outpost low down on the Tennessee river towards Tennessee,
was placed on guard and well cautioned and admonished,
he stood at his post all night, or near fourteen hours, in one
of the fiercest and most terrific snow storms in the history of
the country.

When his absence was noted next morning and relief guard
sent out he was found bravely walking his post. The Indians
were splendid for such service, but they could not face can-
nons—‘“‘big guns on wheels.”’

In the Fall of 1864 some effort was made by some Union
men to re-establish the old government and reinstate the “old
flag” in Cherokee. “The writer is not in possession of suf-
ficient facts bearing on the case to give an intelligent state-
ment of it. As a further evidence of the bad elements, dan-
gerous and perilous incidents of the times the life of Major
Whitaker, an old and valued citizen of the county and a fear-
less officer, was frequently threatened.

Lieutenant-Colonel Stringfield, of the Sixty-ninth, com-
manding the six companies west of the Balsam Mountains,
often had to travel from Asheville and Waynesville to Mur
phy entirely unattended, fording and swimming the creeks
and rivers, at the imminent peril of his life. He narrowly
escaped assassination several times. On one occasion, at the
house of Mrs. Walker, on Valley river, now Andrews, a
would-be assassin approached within ten feet of him while sit-
ting near an open window, a plank broke, the dog barked, and
at the alarm the window and curtain were shut down and his
life was saved, thanks to an overruling Providence.

On 10 March, 1865, General Martin reports the Sixty-
ninth and Eightieth, including their Indian companies, as
having 1,055 present for duty. 103 Off. Rec. Union and
Confed. Armies, 1048.

The writer deeply regrets that he is unable to give the
names of numerous officers and men who died in battle in
Virginia, Tennessee, Georgia, Kentucky and North Carolina,
and of many heroic deeds of all in lower East Tennessee and
North Carolina.

Major Whitaker died in December, 1900, giving no de-
tails. Lieutenant-Colonel McKamy, in 1898. Captain Neff