654 Nortu Carorina Troops, 1861-65. and became a little Confederacy to itself, the Switzerland of the South. All during the war, its people were exempt from raids from the enemy but were vexed with domestic troubles. After Lee’s surrender on 9 April and while negotiations were pending between Generals Johnston and Sherman, wild rumors of every kind filled the air. Just before that time, however, about the date of Sheridan’s great flanking move- ment against Lee, Stoneman’s Cavalry raid set out from Knoxville, Tennessee and moved eastward towards Bristol, Lynchburg and Danville, Virginia, but turning Southward he threatened Greensboro, captured Salisbury, and thence returned via Morganton towards Asheville. He approach- ed Asheville on both sides. On the North he was repulsed by the Sixty-second, Sixty-fourth, Sixty-ninth and Seventy- ninth (Eighth Cavalry, formerly Fourteenth Battalion) or rather by the fragments of them which were left. This was on 28 April. : General Martin being soon after advised of Johnston’s surrender asked and obtained a truce and kindly issued ra- tions to the Federals. They, however, almost immediately violated the truce. On 17 April Colonel James R. Love, of the Sixty-ninth who at that time held Swannanoa Gap had defeated Stoneman’s advance on that side driving his men back to Mill Creek in McDowell county. Here the enemy turned back through Hickory Nut Gap, and Colonel Love being thus outflanked retired under orders from General Martin to Balsam Gap, seven miles west of Waynesville. General Martin himself went on further west, 33 miles, to Franklin, N. ©., accompanied by his accomplished chief of staff, Major A. Gordon, of Louisiana, who is the author of the valuable article on the Organization of our troops in Vol. 1, of this work. A day or two before, General Martin had sent the writer with written instructions under a flag of truce to General Stoneman at Knoxville. This flag with its party of 23 went down the Tennessee and on to Knoxville, about 100 miles through the mountains but they were not suffered to return. They were all thrust into jail at Knoxville for refusing to take the oath, having’ first been Last Barrie anp Last SurRRENDER. 655 insulted on the streets. A Michigan Lieutenant named Abbott with fifty well armed men dismounted and disarmed. our party and trampled the flag of truce under his feet. This was the first day of May. General Martin hearing nothing from the flag of truce turned back with Major Gordon and while spending the night at the hospitable home of John B. Love, near Webster, his son, Colonel John R. Love, came in and gave a stirring ac- count of his fight with the enemy near Waynesville on that day, 9 May, 1865, as stated in Vol. 3, of this work, p. 760. The Federals seemed to have resolved themselves into a general horse gathering association for the exploitation of Buncombe and Haywood counties. Colonel W. H. Thomas commanding Thomas’ Legion (Sixty-ninth and Eightieth Regiments) had his Headquarters at Quallatown, Jackson county, among the Cherokee Indians. Hearing’ of this “Horse-Jockey Battalion,” of Colonel Bartlett of the Third North Carolina (Tory) Regiment, Colonel Thomas moved forward gathering up 200 or 300 men of the different regi- ments from that section who were home on furloughs or convalescent and with some fragments of his own command joined Colonel Love at Balsam Gap greatly to the conster- nation of the pillagers. The Indians whooped and yelled in approved Indian style. Col. Thomas went into Waynesville with this force, the stalwart Indian warriors being feather- ed and painted. The day before in the skirmish with Bart- lett, a Federal named Arrowood was killed at the old Love Mansion fifty feet in front of the present White Sulphur Springs Hotel at Waynesville. As already stated this was doubtless the last man killed in battle east of the Mississippi. That was on 9 May, 1865. A truce was soon had, and the Confederates surrendered upon assurance from Colonel Bartlett that he would control his forces and stop the pillaging and horse stealing. He was plainly told that if he could not the ex-Confederates would re-assemble and control them for him. There was no more trouble in that section. A portion of Bartlett’s Regiment, under Lieutenant-Colo- nel George W. Kirk (whom later events made notorious)