Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 12.djvu/339

 The Cruise of the Nashville. 329

pack of trained hounds. Delivering his sealed message to General Lee in person, who, after reading it, noticing how tired his pony was, said to him: "Young man, you should have some feeling for your horse; dismount and rest him !" at the same time taking from the small saddle-bags attached to his own saddle a buttered biscuit, giving half of it, from his own hand, to the young courier's pony. This act of consideration for the dumb beast made a lasting impres- sion upon my then youthful mind, and taught me ever since to treat all animals as if they had feelings as ourselves. At the moment it occurred to me, hu7igry as I was, that he had better have divided his biscuit with the rider of the animal, or myself; but I soon appre- ciated the motive of his hospitality to the poor beast, and, as before stated, learned a lesson in kindness to animals I shall not soon forget.

WALTER B. BARKER,

^oy Broadway, Nezv York City.

The Cruise of the Nashville.

By Judge Theodore S. Garnett, Jr.

[From Facts Furnished by Lieutenant W. C. Whittle.]

In 1861 the Nashville, then used as a freight and passenger steamer, was seized in the port of Charleston, S. C, by the Confederate au- thorities and soon fitted out for the purpose of taking Messrs. Mason and Slidell to Europe. She was a side-wheel, brig-rigged steamer, of about one thousand two hundred or one thousand four hundred tons, and was therefore deemed by them too large a vessel to run the blockade. That purpose was accordingly abandoned. Captain R. B. Pegram, then in command of the Nashville, fitted her with two small guns and made her ready for sea, with a full crew of officers and men. The following is a list of her officers : Captain, R. B. Pe- gram ; Charles M. Fauntleroy, First Lieutenant ; John W. Bennett, Second Lieutenant ; William C. Whittle, Third Lieutenant ; John H. Ingram, Master ; Jno. L. Ancrum, Surgeon ; Richard Taylor, Pay- master ; James Hood, Chief Engineer ; Assistant Murray, and two others, and the following Midshipmen : W. R. Dalton, William H.

Sinclair, Clarence Cary, J. W. Pegram, W. P. Hamilton,

Thomas and McClintock.

Early in the fall of 1861 she ran out of Charleston, touched at Ber- muda for coal and soon arrived at Southampton, England, having