592 Norru Caroiina Troops, 1861~’65.

Corps was ordered to advance from New Bern to join the
main body of Sherman’s army operating from Fayetteville,
and the Confederates were between the upper and the nether
millstone. The brigade struck Terry’s advancing columns
at South West Creek, just below Kinston, and there was a
sharp conflict, in which the advantage was clearly with the
Confederates. I can well recall the mingled sensations of
elation and anxiety of the young Lieutenant who was officer
of the guard during the long night which followed, and his
bitter disappointment when the morning brought the unwel-
come news that the Federals had been reinforced during the
night, and that the columns of Sherman, advancing from Fay-
etteville, and of Scofield, from Wilmington, were threatening
our rear.

Rapidly evacuating Kinston the Confederate forces were
hurried through Goldsboro and Smithfield and at Averas-
boro checked the advancing enemy.

Three days later, just before the junction of the Union
forces from Wilmington and Fayetteville, General Johnston
gave battle at Bentonville 19-21 March. This was the most
important action fought on North Carolina soil. The scene of
action was a combination of field and thicket near the divid-
ing line between Johnston and Sampson Counties. No one
who witnessed the inspiring sight can ever forget the charge
of S. D. Lee’s Corps, early in the action. With ranks well
aligned, field and staff officers mounted, as upon parade, light
batteries filling the spaces between the brigades, grandly they
swept across the open field, driving the enemy before them.
Later in the day when it became necessary to charge the Fed-
eral divisions entrenched within the almost impenetrable
swamp, and during the two following days to hold against
their assaults the line of hastily formed breastworks, the
Junior Reserves were in the thickest of the fight, and proved
themselves no unworthy comrades of the veterans of the East-
ern and the Western armies. But when the third day closed
the masses of Sherman’s army were outflanking and had
broken through our lines to the left. Slowly and sullenly we
fell back, while Sherman went on to unite his various com-
mands at Goldsboro. While he was replenishing his stores

THe Junior Reserves BRIGADE. 593

and resting his forces there, Johnston’s army was taking a
short breathing spell in camp near Smithfield. When Sher-
man’s hundred thousand soldiers began their last advance, our
little army moved too and in the same direction. We passed
through Raleigh 12 April, 1865, just one day ahead of the
enemy, and there learned of Lee’s surrender. As we went on
by easy marches to High Point, Generals Johnston and Sher-
man entered upon their abortive negotiations for peace at
Durham. When those failed the army was finally surren-
dered 26 April, the soldiers were paroled 2 May and sent
home upon parole and the war was over.

For a quarter of a century the returned Confederate sol-
diers have kept the letter and the spirit of that parole. They
have given no undivided allegiance to their country’s flag.
They are to-day as loyal to its honor and as devoted to the
maintenance of its supremacy as they are faithful to the
memories of the past, and are ready to testify their devo-
tion not with the flowers of word tribute merely, but with the
ripened fruit of loyal deeds.

These regiments of Junior Reserves organized at a late
period of the war, for the most part upon detached duty, and
participating only for a short time in a regular campaign,
cannot vie with the older regiments in the lists of famous
battles inscribed upon their battle flags. Three regiments
and one battalion of boys, with few company officers and no
private above 18 years of age—and yet those who were with
them and of them, who saw their cheerful endurance of every
privation, their behavior in camp, their gallantry upon the
battle field, know that no braver soldiers wore the livery of

gray.
General Hoke, their attached and beloved commander, thus

writes concerning them:

“The question of the courage of the Junior Reserves was
well established by themselves in the battle below Kinston,
and at the battle of Bentonville. At Bentonville, you will

remember, they held a very important part of the battlefield
in opposition to Sherman’s old and tried soldiers, and re-

38