Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 29.djvu/129

 'l. <>j' Ilixtury Com in nice of Grand Camp C. V. 113

This letter was published in the Southern Historical Society Pa- pers, in March, 1884. About a year thereafter, one Colonel Henry Stone, styling' himself "Late Brevet-Colonel U. S. Volunteers, A. A. G. Army of the Cumberland," realizing the gravity of the state- ments contained in this letter, and the disgrace these, if uncontra- dicted, would bring on General Sherman and his army, and especially on the staff, of which he (Colonel Stone) was a member, wrote a letter to the Rev. J. William Jones, D. D., the then editor of the Historical Society Papers, in which he undertook to show that the Myers letter was not written by any officer in General Sherman's army. (This letter can be found in Vol. 13, S. H. S. Papers, page 439.) The reasons assigned by Colonel Stone were plausibly set forth, and Dr. Jones, in his anxiety to do justice even to Sherman's " bummers," after publishing Colonel Stone's letter, said editorially, he was "frank to admit that Colonel Stone seems to have made out his case against the authenticity of this letter." If the matter had rested here, we would not have thought of using this letter in our report, notwithstanding the fact (i) that we think the letter bears the impress of genuineness on its face; (2) it is vouched for by what Dr. Jones termed a "responsible source," and what the first paper publishing it cited as a " distinguished lady," who, it also stated, said that the original was "still preserved and could be shown and substantiated;" (3) the statements contained in Colonel Stone's letter are only his statements, uncorroborated and not vouched for by any one, or by any documentary evidence of any kind, and being those of an alleged accomplice, are not entitled to any weight in a court of justice; (4) we think the reasons assigned by Colonel Stone for the non-genuineness of this letter are for the most part not incon- sistent with its genuineness ; and (5) some of his statements are, ap- parently, inconsistent with some of the facts as they appear in the records we have examined, e. g., He says " that of the ninety regi- ments of Sherman's army, which might have passed on the march near Camden, S. C., but a single one a New Jersey regiment was from the Middle States. All the rest were from the West. A letter (he says) from the only Thomas J. Myers ever in the army would never contain such a phrase," referring to the fact that Myers had said this stolen jewelry, &c., would be scattered "all over the North and Middle States." Sherman's statement of the organization of his army on this march shows there were several regiments in it from New York and Pennsylvania, besides one from Maryland and