Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 30.djvu/319

 The Campaign and Battle of Ly nch.hu ra. 311

her clothing and other valuables. Many wounded were left in Major Hutter's yard; indeed, the flight was so rapid that all but the slightly wounded were left behind, together with many small arms and some cannon. Early may not have done all he might have done, but certain it is Hunter's whole campaign seems to have been a farce. He was gallant when there was no enemy, and a coward when they were in sight. He burned the Military Institute, which was not even garrisoned by boys, and set fire to Governor Letcher's house, which only a woman protected. If the ' bravest are the tenderest,' how true it is that the cowards are the cruelest. The renegade, David H. Strother (Porte Crayon), was with Hunter as one of his staff at Major Hutter's. Another traitor to his State, his name and his race.

" The soldiers who came up with Early gave the most distressing accounts of the condition of affairs in Louisa county, where the Yankee raids have done so much harm to the unprotected. They say the desolation is so great that as they marched through the women and children flocked to the road for something to eat, and would grasp eagerly all the bits of cold corn-bread they could spare them from their haversacks. Is it not horrible to think of?"

A remarkable incident happened in connection with the depreda- tion of Hunter's troops at Lexington. When the corps of cadets was ordered to leave the Institute on the approach of Hunter, they deposited their trunks in the residences of neighboring gentlemen for safe keeping.

Young Mr. Carter H. Harrison, of Staunton, was then a cadet, and with several others, put his trunk at Professor Campbell's to save it. When the battle was over at Lynchburg and Hunter was gone, the cadets were not put in the chasing column, but were relieved from further active duty. Mr. Harrison, with others of the corps, went to the battlefield, and during his inspection visited the field hospital where the wounded of the enemy were being cared for by our surgeons. He noticed one man who was badly wounded in the leg, and whose pantaloons were ripped up that the surgeon might more easily dress the wound. As Harrison looked at the soldier he observed his own initials on his socks, and upon further investigation discovered that all the man's underclothes were similarly marked and all belonged to him, and were a part of those he had left in his trunk at Professor Campbell's.

The man confessed that they had looted Professor Campbell's house,