Raiding With Morgan

by Jim R. Woolard

  Being new to the rapidly changing nature of a military campaign, Ty had no inkling how much his tiredness and discomfort would be rendered inconsequential when they crested the steep hill overlooking Brandenburg. Ty had known from early childhood that he was gifted with exceptional eyesight. He possessed the ability to discern at great distances and in great detail things that were fuzzy and indistinguishable to others.

  The events unfolding below his perch on Brandenburg Hill thrilled him to the bone. The hoof-churned road beneath them descended sharply into the cluster of buildings and homes bunched at the waterfront. At the bottom of the town wharf, the thousand-yard-wide, muddy current of the high-running Ohio stretched east and west for miles. Across the river loomed the immediate objective of General Morgan’s army—the lush shore of Indiana, punctuated by farmhouses, with orange haystacks in golden fields, and swatches of trees and underbrush, which were light green along the shore and dark green on the overlooking ridge.

  Ty spotted troopers on the Indiana bank, but no horses. The dismounted troopers were hurriedly taking cover in the nearest stand of trees. On the near bank moored at the Brandenburg Wharf was a packet steamboat, JOHN B. MCCOMBS painted on a sign atop its wheelhouse, and a smaller steamboat, the Alice Dean, both with stilled paddles. Their gangplanks were empty. Neither cavalrymen nor horses were being loaded. The troopers had sought cover with their mounts behind town buildings and in the woods bordering Brandenburg.

  A sharp report echoing through the river bottom accounted for the unnatural lack of activity on the near bank. Ty tensed in the saddle. He’d never witnessed armies firing at each other. Truth was, he was pure green when it came to soldiering. He’d never been shot at, nor had he ever shot at another human being.

  A small ship steamed from upriver, black smoke spewing from its single stack. Ty had gleaned sufficient nautical terminology from the volumes in Grandfather Mattson’s library to categorize the fast-approaching vessel. The snub-nosed craft was armored with iron plating. Three howitzers protruded from embrasures cut through the iron plating and the heavy oak timbers beneath it. It was a Yankee gunboat, a bulldog whose bark preceded a dangerously sharp bite.

  A bluish white, funnel-shaped cloud spouted from the gunboat’s left bow as she launched a shell that had troopers cringing as it hit and exploded in the middle of Brandenburg’s main street. The gunboat then snapped a shell at the scrambling troopers on the opposite bank. Ty was absorbing a vital lesson in how the fortunes of war turned with the flip of a coin. General Morgan’s ferryboats were as vulnerable as sitting ducks to shellfire. One small gunboat was holding a two-thousand-man army at bay, allowing Union forces in hot pursuit to gain ground and imperil the success of Morgan’s mission.

  “Where are Captain Byrnes and our artillery?” Lieutenant Shannon inquired aloud.

  Round shot began pelting the gunboat—solid balls sending up tall geysers of water or thudding against its armor, shells bursting in flashes of red flame. The Confederate balls were coming from two 12-pound howitzers positioned on a rising eminence along the Ohio, north of Brandenburg. Ty couldn’t tell if Captain Byrnes’s shells were inflicting any real damage on the snub-nosed ship, but they were forcing it to change course frequently to present a moving target and interfering with the accuracy of its howitzers.

  After an hour of exchanging fire, the Federal gunboat withdrew up the Ohio. Its retreat was akin to a dam bursting. Horse holders hustled to the wharf and the ferrying of the horses belonging to the troopers on the Indiana shore commenced.

  Lieutenant Shannon tracked the withdrawing gunboat with his telescope. “She was the Springfield.”

  “Yes, sir,” Ty agreed. “The letters on the bow were awfully small and one of our rounds splintered the wood there, but you could read them if you looked close.”

  “That was half a mile away. You can see that well, lad?”

  “Yes, sir, I can see individual feathers on birds at fifty yards,” Ty said with no hint of the braggart in his voice. “A farmer is hiding in that big white barn across the river, well over to our left. The peak of his straw hat is showing above the bottom sill of the hayloft door.”

  Lieutenant Shannon trained his telescope in that direction. “By damned, he’s there, all right. Eyesight like yours, lad, could be plumb useful to General Morgan’s scout company and advance guard. I’ll make mention of you in my report.”

  The lieutenant’s observation pleased Ty greatly. He had wracked his brain during the entire night ride trying to determine how an untrained, inexperienced, would-be cavalryman might be accepted into the ranks of General Morgan’s raiders. Maybe his keen eyesight was his ticket to enlistment.

  An officer riding a Denmark Thoroughbred joined Lieutenant Shannon and Ty. “Lieutenant, you may send word to the general that mounted vedettes are patrolling the Brandenburg road at five hundred yards, and sentries are guarding the road at one hundred yards. Per his orders, they will remain in place until they’re called to board the last ferry departing the wharf.”

  The large-mouthed, fish-eyed officer cleared his throat, hawked, and spat. He surveyed Ty from hat to spurs and said, “I’ve been meaning to ask, Lieutenant, who’s this Texas pup? You find him hiding under a rain barrel in Garnettsville?”

  “No, sir, Captain Bell, he found us,” Lieutenant Shannon said. “He claims he’s Captain Mattson’s son.”

  “Aw, owl shit, Shawn,” Captain Bell said, forgetting rank for the moment. “That’s the biggest whopper I’ve ever heard. If Owen had any offspring, he wouldn’t be drifting around the country unclaimed. Owen wouldn’t abide it.”

  “Well, Clute, we’ll find out shortly, one way or the other,” Shawn Shannon said.

  “Sweet Jesus, I hope I’m there when they meet up,” Captain Bell said. “I’d fork over a year’s pay just for the chance to catch Owen speechless for the first time in memory.”

  Ty assumed from Captain Bell’s depiction that Owen Mattson was a man seldom surprised by circumstance or the men around him—the unflappable officer always in control—the exact opposite of how Ty saw himself. He was beginning to wish he’d stayed home instead of diving into this sea of uncertainty.

  While Ty both wanted and dreaded the initial meeting of father and son, that meeting couldn’t happen any too soon. The tight knot in his belly would gnaw at his shaky confidence until he learned how his father reacted to his sudden, unsolicited appearance.

  “Come along, lad. We’ll squeeze past the troopers clogging the road and wait for General Morgan at the wharf,” Shawn Shannon said, pulling Ty’s Remington from his belt. The lieutenant rolled his fingers, reversing the pistol, and offered the weapon to Ty, butt first, a clever maneuver foreign to Ty, one that reinforced how unschooled he was with firearms.

  “No need for anyone to think you’re a prisoner,” Lieutenant Shannon said by way of explanation. “Either you’re Owen’s son or the gutsiest spy I’ve ever encountered.”

  Lieutenant Shannon dispatched a messenger to inform General Morgan as to status of the rear guard, and stationed Ty and himself at the railing of the wharf, where they watched officers guide men and horses across the gangplanks of the two steamers for the balance of the afternoon. A scrawny, white-goateed private missing his teeth kept them from starving. He delivered a rasher of salt pork, pole bread, and a flask of brandy mixed with milk.

  “That’s Private E.J. Pursley,” Lieutenant Shannon said. “Can’t hit his own ass at close range with a pistol, but he can find vittles in the middle of Texas brush country.”

  At five o’clock in the evening, Ty was standing on the ground, leaning against Reb, half asleep, when the lieutenant announced the First Brigade was on Indiana soil, which meant the other half of General Morgan’s command remained in Kentucky.

  The two steamboats initiated the ferrying of the Second Brigade. Cannon boomed and all eyes swept upriver. The Springfield had returned with a second Federal gunboat. The troopers waiting to board the Alice Dean froze into stone, awaiting
orders whether to continue loading or seek cover. One wrong move or word might well turn a controlled situation into absolute chaos.

  A thunderous voice sang out: “Hold your ranks! Hold your ranks!” The waiting line of horse holders eased apart, creating an aisle for a captain mounted on a chestnut gelding, with a blazed face and four white stockings.

  The captain continued to shout orders as he advanced. “Hold your ranks! Control your animals! Ignore the gunboats! Captain Byrnes’s artillery will deal with them.”

  The rider drew abreast of Ty and Lieutenant Shannon. He sat his horse with uncommon grace. Somehow, he seemed familiar to Ty.

  The captain removed his hat and acknowledged the troopers softly hailing him. The exposed red hair, emerald green eyes, and white teeth visible when he smiled jolted the sleep from Ty and brought him up on his tiptoes. He was exactly as Boone Jordan had described him, right down to square shoulders and well-deep voice.

  He was staring at Captain Owen Mattson.

  His father.

  CHAPTER 4

  Ty realized his father was staring back at him.

  Dare he speak?

  He opened his mouth. Excitement had knotted his tongue and he couldn’t utter a sound. His father dismounted and led the chestnut onto the gangplank of the Alice Dean. Then he was gone, lost in the mass of horses crowding the steamship’s stern.

  “You sure you’re Owen’s son?” Lieutenant Shannon asked. “He didn’t show any sign he recognized you.”

  Ty recovered from the shock of seeing his father in the flesh, fulfilling a lifelong dream at last. To get that close to him again, he couldn’t lose the trust of Lieutenant Shannon. “Lieutenant, the only way you’ll understand about Father and me is to hear me out.”

  Smiling, the lieutenant said, “I bet it’s a corker of a tale, and I’ve time to listen. Have at it, lad.”

  Ty decided the best place to start was by explaining his talk with Boone Jordan that had set him chasing after his father. The lieutenant proved a rapt listener. He was much more interested in what Ty had to say than the artillery duel between the Princeton, her cohort, and Captain Byrnes’s howitzers, which ended with the Federal gunboats churning upriver into the dark night.

  By the time Ty finished, Lieutenant Shannon’s head was shaking, not from doubt, but from wonderment. “Wildest story I’ve ever heard. Your grandfather and your paw have to be the two most stubborn people from Kentucky ever, and that’s a bunch of folks.”

  “What do I do now?” an uncertain Ty asked.

  “You best stick with me. Owen and I are on detached duty with General Morgan’s staff. We’re the general’s eyes and ears when his command’s on the move or engaging the enemy. He can’t always rely on his young messengers. I’ll escort you to General Morgan’s headquarters, wherever that might be tonight. Sooner or later, Owen will report to him. That suit you?”

  “Yes, sir. I don’t relish stumbling around in the dark, asking directions to Father from armed strangers.”

  The ferriage of the Second Brigade lasted until midnight. Late in the evening, General Morgan and his personal entourage arrived at the Brandenburg Wharf. Messengers, dressed mainly in farm clothes, a few too young to shave, and one a mere stripling, if Ty guessed correctly, all led their mounts aboard the John B. McCombs with the horse-handling skill of veteran cavalrymen. If there was a place for those puppies in Morgan’s ranks, there had to be one for Ty, too.

  Black servants traveling on foot, wearing captured blue uniforms, carried items in hampers, baskets, and cloth bags. Apparently, General Morgan didn’t completely forgo the comforts of Hopemont, his Lexington home, while serving in the field.

  General Morgan was leading a handsome charger. Ty learned later the gelding was Glencoe, the general’s favorite saddler. Lieutenant Shannon came to attention and saluted. Not being a trooper, Ty doffed his hat and stood ramrod straight.

  General Morgan returned the salute and said, “You still have your young charge in tow, Lieutenant. I believe that’s a pistol hanging from his belt. You’ve confirmed his identity?”

  “To my satisfaction, sir.”

  “What about with Captain Mattson? Has be been introduced to his mysterious son?”

  “Not yet. I’ve learned the boy’s story of how he got here. Owen’s in for quite a surprise, sir.”

  General Morgan threw back his head and laughed. “Oh yes, but isn’t he now! Lieutenant, thanks for finding a spot of humor in a long, long day. I’m pushing inland once I’m across the river and we have ships to burn. Please remain with the rear guard and confirm their destruction to me personally. Captain Bell is in command.”

  Ty was initially appalled at the thought of burning the two steamboats. The flaking paint and dull varnish of the smaller Alice Dean’s wheelhouse and superstructure revealed her age, an old Federal mail packet that had plied the waters of the Ohio for a considerable number of years. On the other hand, by her spotless hull, white painted wheelhouse, polished woodwork, shiny brass fixtures, and powerful boiler, the larger John B. McCombs, with her spacious passenger cabin and cargo rigging, was a vessel that had cost tens of thousands of dollars to build.

  To destroy either of them willfully seemed a terrible crime to Ty. Grandfather Mattson considered private property a sacred possession. The burning, looting, or theft of another person’s property was tantamount to murder. But while appalled, Ty wasn’t naïve.

  If the steamboats weren’t destroyed, what guarantee was there the pursuing Yankee cavalry wouldn’t make use of them? As long as Union horsemen were stranded on the south bank of the Ohio, General Morgan’s lead on them would increase by the hour—each hour gained being a decided advantage for his invading force.

  Lieutenant Shannon and Ty crossed the river on the final passage of the John B. McCombs. Reb took the boat ride like he was grazing on fresh grass. Ty was beginning to respect the gray’s demeanor. While nothing disturbed him—cannon fire, the proximity of other horses in a crowded cargo bay, shadows in the night—Reb was alert and ready to respond to Ty’s wishes at the slightest tug of his reins. Ty owed a big debt to Boone Jordan’s knowledge of horses.

  A new development awaited them on the Indiana bank. Captain Clute Bell, fish eyes big as saucers in the deck lamps of the John B. McCombs, met them at the foot of the gangplank. “Been a change of plans, Shawn. Captain Ballard is an old acquaintance of Colonel Duke’s. On the strength of Ballard’s promise to sail the McCombs upriver to keep the blue bellies from seizing it, General Morgan decided to spare his ship. Our orders to burn the Alice Dean stand.”

  A half hour of hard work freed the two packets of Rebel horses, troopers, and equipment. The John B. McCombs departed for Louisville at full speed. The captain of the Alice Dean, a diminutive, spade-bearded individual in frock coat and leather-billed cap with gold piping, was forced from his cabin at gunpoint; his ranting curses bluing the air.

  “Wouldn’t want to meet up with him again if he held the gun,” Captain Bell said. “There’s a lot of heat in his boiler.”

  The Alice Dean’s layers of old paint and varnish erupted into flame at the touch of a match. Her superstructure virtually exploded when the fire reached her upper decks. In minutes, the packet boat was a great, raging torch. The glare from the burning boat illuminated the Ohio for miles, turning night into day for those watching on the Indiana and Kentucky banks of the Ohio.

  Lieutenant Shannon was the first to hear the nasty whine of a bullet. A soft plopping tweaked Ty’s ear. Then rifle balls were zipping by. The shrill whinnying of a horse in pain excited the confused troopers. A trooper at water’s edge warned, “It’s the blue bellies. They can see us from Brandenburg.”

  “Mount up,” Captain Bell ordered. “We’ve finished our business here.”

  Ty needed no additional urging to fly into Reb’s saddle. They raced for the woods beyond the effective range of the sniping blue bellies, unaware that the Alice Dean’s captain and his crew were venting their frustration by chucking
rocks after them until they realized the Union bullets were just as deadly to them and sought cover.

  At Captain Bell’s command, Ty slowed Reb to a walk. The boat fire on the river was bright as lanterns amongst the covering trees. Lieutenant Shannon winked at Ty. “Something’s wrong with your hat, lad.”

  Ty plucked his hat from his head. The brim was flat all the way around. The brass star, which had pinned up the right side, was missing. Ty gulped. That soft plopping he’d heard was a bullet snipping the brass star from his hat a mere four inches above his ear.

  His jaw quivering, Ty made no mention of the near miss to Lieutenant Shannon. No matter how hard he gripped his saddle horn during their ride to General Morgan’s headquarters, he couldn’t keep his hands from trembling.

  Welcome to the war, Mr. Ty Mattson.

  CHAPTER 5

  Bugles awakened Ty with the first trace of light in the eastern sky. He felt as if he hadn’t slept a solitary wink. The sultry air of the barnyard smelled of horses and the smoke of cooking fires. He rolled over and rubbed the gumminess from his eyes, lingering too long in his gum poncho, single-blanket bed to suit Private Pursley, who shook him with a knotty fist, though Ty was clearly awake.

  Ty gained his feet and found Lieutenant Shannon and six troopers watching him with bemused smiles. The slim trooper with the waxed mustache, which filled his nostrils and circled the corners of his mouth, said, “Sort of laggardly for Owen Mattson’s son, ain’t he?”

  “More than likely he’s trainable, Cally,” Lieutenant Shannon said. “Ty, we arrived too late for introductions last night. Private Cally Smith here is from Georgetown. He was in the marble business with his father. The two hefty jaspers that wear out horses are Privates Ad and Ebb White. They’re from the Tennessee border and are best known for the quality of their corn squeezin’s.”