Ghosts of the Siege

by Steven Abernathy

  “Sadly, at least in the mind of General Greene, no one believed his theory and he could find no local interest in eliminating Spanish Moss from the city. As I told you earlier, he was buried in Colonial Cemetery, his grave lost for many years before his remains were rediscovered and buried in this square. Before his body was brought here, the trees of this park were heavily laden with Spanish Moss. Now, as you can see, it is all gone. Its absence is not accidental or coincidental. The truth is that the spirits of General Greene and his son, George Washington Greene, arise from their graves each night and move about in the trees picking any growth of the moss from the branches and carrying it away. General Greene always was bound by duty to improve the lot of the citizens of this country. Even though he could enlist no help from the very citizens he was trying to protect, he feels duty bound to this day to protect the city from another epidemic of yellow fever.”

  I sat silent for several minutes while looking around the park and imagining I could see the spirits of the Greenes moving around in the tree tops while picking away the Spanish Moss and moving it away to some safe location, perhaps in a different spiritual plane. The more I thought about it, the stranger was the situation. Was there another reason for the absence of Spanish Moss from Johnson Square? I hadn’t really believed in ghosts until I met Billy. Was it such a leap to believe a spirit from the 1700s had the desire and ability to clear away all vestiges of a parasitic plant from the trees near his grave? I decided after consideration that Billy was right. There was no other reasonable explanation. The facts were that Spanish Moss grew unabated all over the city of Savannah except for this one small park, and that the reason for its absence in this place was nightly harvesting by the ghost of General Nathaniel Greene.

  “Billy, I’m really glad we met,” I spoke aloud without thinking of the unwanted attention I might draw from passersby. A young couple sitting on a bench near the monument stared at me with curiosity, but I, or, rather, we, didn’t care. “You make history come alive and intertwine it with the present in ways I have never imagined was possible.” The young couple whispered to each other for a brief moment, then arose from their seat and moved toward the other side of the square, keeping a wary eye on me as they hurried away. “I suppose we should continue on our way,” I shifted to the telepathic mode of speech Billy had taught me. I could feel regret of leaving the square when we began to move away. As we reached the edge of the park Billy caused me to turn and assume a posture of military attention as I faced the Green monument. Slowly, my right hand rose in salute, which I held for several seconds before dropping my arm and turning back to Congress Street. Billy and I were silent as we made the walk toward Martin Luther King Boulevard.

  Chapter 11

  We were each absorbed in his own thoughts as we walked toward my truck. It was an odd thing, though. I was thinking about my family, and how I might explain to them this strange association with a ghost from the Revolutionary War. At the same time I could experience the spirit’s thoughts as he replayed in his mind the events that conspired to lose the body of a great American general for more than a hundred years. I suppose my friend was sensing my thoughts as well as his own, but chose to say nothing. Perhaps we were both becoming used to our other-worldly association. It was one of those things that would probably send me straight to psychiatric treatment if I ever mentioned it to anyone else.

  Billy steered me back up Turner Boulevard toward the dormitory in which we had met, but stopped about half way there. We stood in silence for several minutes. I could tell from his previous description of the location and from the emotions welling up in him that this was the place where the Carolina Redoubt had stood. Billy initiated whatever magic was required within my brain to make the modern-day streets and structures disappear, replaced by the vision of a fog shrouded earthen fort. Within the redoubt were perhaps twenty soldiers dressed in the traditional red and white British Army uniform and half again that many dressed in the rough, haphazard clothing common to militiamen. All were armed with muskets and were preparing their weapons for battle as guards peered intently into the fog searching for the attack they knew was coming from the west. The dense fog made any measurement of distance an uncertain thing, but in what seemed to be far in the distance the faint ghostly visage of an American battle flag was slowly waving back and forth, perhaps defining a focal point for the troops about to attack the British defenders. There was no wind to move the flag, and it was only in my imagination that I could see the American soldier, possibly a young boy much like Billy, proudly waving his country’s flag to rally the troops around him. Within the fort a guard’s voice could be heard announcing the first glimpse of the Americans in the distance. For a moment the shuffling of feet could be heard as the soldiers moved to the wall and peer at the faint image of the Stars and Stripes waving in the distance. The sight froze them in place and for a long time there was complete silence.

  Billy and I stood in silence as well for several minutes engulfed in the fog, the grave-like hush, and the surreal vision before us. After a long while, beyond my ability to define when or how it happened, the vision of pre-battle tension was gone and we were once more standing on a sidewalk adjacent to Turner Boulevard, just across the street from the SCAD Museum of Art. It took a moment for me to realize that the Carolina Redoubt had stood on the very ground now occupied by the museum. Billy was kind enough to allow me a few minutes to reorient myself to this change, which I could only describe as a sudden warp through time. Finally, he directed me to walk once more toward Turner House. There is a small guard shack at the entrance to the dormitory, from which a smiling lady in her mid-thirties wearing a SCAD security uniform appeared. “Have the kids stopped up another toilet for you?” she laughed.

  “Actually, it was a bathtub filled with paint and glue this time. How are you Latisha?” I answered.

  “About as well as a mother of six can be. Their dad has been sent to Afghanistan again, so I’m corralin’ them by myself ‘till he gets back. I’ll survive, though. Always do. ‘Ya need to get back inside, hon’?”

  “No,” I answered, thinking quickly, “I just wanted to stop and say hello. Be sure to tell the sergeant that we’re all thinking of him and we appreciate his service.” The guard’s eyes teared up slightly as I started to turn away. I heard her say, “Thanks, hon’” as I walked away from the building.

  “The guard house is just about the spot where I intercepted General McIntosh,” Billy whispered as we reached the street. “He was leading the American column, which was tasked to attack the Carolina Redoubt.” He looked all around us, as if remembering the event exactly as it had happened. “The fog was very dense, and the general could not see his target beyond the abatis, which was only about a hundred feet in front of his position As I approached him from the south I could just see through the fog his troop column extending behind him, beginning at about the back side of that structure,” he pointed toward Turner House, “and extending down the embankment into the creek and beyond.”

  Abatis was a word with which I was not familiar, but Billy projected such a forlorn tone and was so engrossed in his story that I decided to let it pass for the moment.

  “The general could hear the cannon and musket fire to his right at the Spring Hill Redoubt,” Billy continued. “What he did not know, could not know, was that the attack on Spring Hill was faltering, and I had been sent to find him and redirect the Americans to aid the French in their attack on the Spring Hill Redoubt. I was just about to…” Suddenly he stopped, and I felt he was disconcerted by some remembrance. My internal guest stared at me intently, a distinct and disquieting sensation when I considered eyes within my own eyes staring daggers into my eyes. You must remember back to the opening paragraph of this story when I warned that you would think I was crazy. I felt the discomfort of his intense scrutiny for a minute or more until he finally released his gaze and spoke.

  “I have done you a disservice,” he began, the intensity of his voice changed to on
e of contrition. “I only now sensed that you are unfamiliar with the term abatis, a word familiar to anyone aware of siege warfare in my time or generations before. The fact of your lack of acquaintance with that term reminded me of the likelihood that you are unfamiliar with the battle itself, and it is unfair of me to speak of bits and snippets of the story without providing you with the context of those pieces.” He paused for only a moment before asking, “Would you like for me to explain the entire battle sequence, at least as seen from my own perspective? I realize my emotions have been stirred as we have trodden upon parts of the battleground, and that you have questioned those emotions. Perhaps the whole of the story would help you to understand.”

  My answer was almost instantaneous. Having been a history buff for many years I had several shelves at home bowed under the weight of books on the American Civil War. For some reason, however, I had never read much about the actual battles of the American Revolution. Perhaps it was time for me to begin my education about that war for freedom. “I would love to hear the entire story, Billy,” I answered brightly.

  “The story will be long,” he answered. “Perhaps we should find a fitting place to sit.”

  When he suggested ‘a fitting place to sit’ my mind immediately clicked. The most fitting place of which I knew in Savannah was the Savannah History Museum located in the visitors’ center only a few steps from where we stood. There was a section in the museum filled with Revolutionary War artifacts, manikins with period uniforms and maps of the battle. There was no better place to learn of the battle from one who had seen it firsthand. The only problem, I realized as I looked at my watch, was the fact that it was late afternoon and the museum and center were about to close.

  “Billy,” I questioned, “when we were at the Spring Hill Redoubt, you passed through the walls of the visitors’ center to find the place where you fell on the battlefield.” I felt within me his remembrance of the event, so continued, “Can you cause me to pass through the walls into the structure as a part of you?”

  He thought silently for a short while before answering, “No, you are of earthly substance. The building is of earthly substance. There is no way I can cause one to pass through the other without some kind of destruction.” He was pensive for another moment before adding, “If your desire is to enter the structure unseen by others, perhaps I could create a diversion that would draw their eyes in another direction while we entered.”

  I explained that the building would be closed to the public and the door locked within the next ten or fifteen minutes. Billy suggested a plan. He would disengage from my body just outside the parking lot entrance to the visitors’ center, then would enter the structure as an invisible spirit while I waited outside. When all the guests had left the building, a guard would doubtless come to lock the door, hopefully from the outside, to secure the building for the night. Just as the guard was about to exit the building, Billy would make himself visible as a vaporous entity, as he had been when we first met. The guard would see a ghost dressed in colonial garb, and would doubtless be as shocked as I had been. Once the guard’s attention was riveted on him, Billy would slowly move toward the front of the building, with the guard cautiously following him. As they moved away from the door, I could enter and move the other way toward the museum. Billy planned to lead the guard up the steep staircase at the front of the building, then disappear as they reached the second floor. If the plan had the desired effect, the guard would be shaken and would probably sit and collect himself for a few minutes before slowly descending the stairs and exiting the visitors’ center in shock. If his shaking hands would allow, he would lock the building from the outside and walk to the bus stop to go home and tell his family of his own, personal Savannah ghost story. The only question would be whether or not he chose to return to work at the center the next day or sought employment elsewhere.

  The plan worked perfectly. By the time dusk was transforming into darkness and the street lights were flickering on outside, Billy and I were settling in on a bench within sight of the Revolutionary War section of the museum. All was quiet around us. The ghost was not within me, but was hovering nearby, and it took some time for me to once more adjust to his ethereal appearance. He drifted to a spot near the center of the exhibit.

  “Even as a spirit,” he said, “I have never known whether things happen by directive from God, or at the behest of some atavistic memory, or simply by coincidence.” Seeing that I did not understand, he continued, “You remember when I passed into this structure from the other side…from the area of the Spring Hill Redoubt? When I entered I was drawn to this spot.” He stood motionless. “This very spot is where I fell on the battlefield.” He motioned to the nearby wall to his north. “The abatis began just where this wall is placed, and just there,” he pointed to a map on the wall, “was a gap in the branches that had been blown away by our cannon fire.” Motionless once more, he looked forlorn as he practically moaned, “I fell here, my body shattered by grape and musket balls.

  “Now what force could have directed,” he asked with a brighter voice, “the people of your time to build a tribute to the very battle in which I was killed…in the very spot where I was killed? Did they know of me? Did you know of me? I think not.” His ethereal arms and hands waved around in a circle. “It was not just me. Many were being killed in this area. The bodies of my comrades hung on the abatis, and many were dead or dying nearby when I was struck with the death blow. Do you think a memory buried deeply in the minds of the generations who came after my time remembered just enough to place this memorial in just the right spot?”

  His question seemed sincere, and I was formulating an answer when he said, “Abatis! I haven’t explained the abatis to you. First that, then I will tell you the story of the battle as I saw it.

  “The abatis was the first line of defense for a redoubt or a trench or gun emplacement. When time allowed, the abatis was made of tree trunks laid side to side at an upward angle, where the high end, placed toward the enemy, was sharpened and the low end was buried in the ground for stability. This created a nearly impenetrable spot where the attacking force must stop to destroy or work around the structure in order to reach the moat and wall of the defensive fort.

  “In this case, the British had to construct a very long wall of defense around the city very quickly, the abatis was made by the simple expedient of cutting many trees and arranging them around the redoubts and trenches with the trunks facing inward and the many branches facing toward their enemy…toward us…creating a dense tangle of branches through which we had to hack or climb to reach the outward trench and then the wall of the redoubt. An added benefit to the British as they constructed the abatis in this manner was that the many trees cut outside their defensive walls created a large cleared area that gave them an excellent field of fire against any attacking force.

  “Except for the extreme northwest of the British perimeter, an area covered in swamp and small creeks flowing into the Savannah River, there were many accessible trees, so the abatis was quite thick and formidable. It was only in that northwest section that the abatis was scattered and more penetrable, but according to General Lincoln the British commander was confident that the city was well protected in that area by the terrain and the river. He was a canny planner, the general. I know he considered attacking that weak northwestern section, and later did include a feint in that spot in his battle plans, but he realized that a thousand troops slogging through the swamps would make for an attack at deadly slow speed, and would allow a relatively small British guard to quickly annihilate the column.”

  The image before me smiled, a very personable smile that made me chuckle as I thought of Casper the Friendly Ghost. Billy questioned my laugh, and I tried to explain the cartoon character, but he was unaware even of still photography, so the idea of moving pictures or broadcast television was incomprehensible to him. We both decided to move on without further explanation.

  “Do you understand the abatis
?” he asked.

  “Yes,” I quickly answered. “I have seen prisons with fences topped with razor wire slanted inward to keep the inmates from escaping. It sounds similar to the abatis you describe, both in design and intent.”

  “I do not know razor wire,” Billy answered, “but it is possible it is your century’s equivalent of the abatis. Perhaps an occasion will arise when you can show me an example.”

  “If I can,” I conceded. “Now, should I settle in while you tell me of the battle?”

  “Ah, yes. The battle,” the ghost whispered. He thought for a moment, saying primarily to himself, “Where to begin?”

  Chapter 12

  At length my friend arrived at a fitting starting place for his story and began, “I have already told you of crossing the Savannah River and almost drowning in the current, and of accompanying General Pulaski to meet the French commander, General and Admiral Jean Baptiste Charles Henri Hector Compt d’Estaing.” Billy spat the entire name out in obvious disgust before emphasizing his extreme dislike of the man with a sour look on his face. “I could belabor the point of how much I despised d’Estaing from the first moment I met him, but that would not add even a morsel of gravitas to my story. Suffice it to say that I was not the only one to assess the man’s deficient character and unmerited conceit. Thankfully, I was not required to deal with the officer on a daily basis as were many others. One time when we were alone I asked Count Pulaski what he thought of the French General. He laughed and said the general put him in mind of the back end of an overfed horse…fat, useless, and full of excrement.

  “At daybreak I rode back to report to General Lincoln, finding him moving his army from Ebenezer to an area known as Cherokee Hill, only six or seven miles from Savannah proper. We rode the next morning to find General d’Estaing before he left on his reconnoiter of the British defenses, but became lost and did not find him until late in the day.” Billy thought for a moment before adding, “That would have been on September 16, which turned out to be a very interesting day. Thinking back on it, the events of that day likely portended all of the difficulties that would follow on the day we finally attacked the British.