Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 34.djvu/255

 From Petersburg to Appomaltox. 247

tenant, you have not your guns with you, for I am putting the guns in position now to meet the enemy."

GENERAL LEE APPEARS.

"I am sorry," I said, "but I have got ten men here who can serve a gun, and I saw a Yankee gun just now coming into the village, and I would like to have that, for my men can handle it." "Very well," said he, "come with me and I will turn it over to you." So we went together and found the gun with the Yankee company, which had been captured, and some of the cavalry that had it in charge, and I took possession of it with my ten men and got ready to carry it into position as soon as General Alexander should tell me where to place it.

Before any further orders came from General Alexander, I saw General Lee ride up into the village with two Federal officers, one riding on each side of him. He came from the Lynchburg side of his army. I knew from seeing these officers with General Lee that the whole thing was about up. Soon after this the news came that the army had surrendered. Before we heard what the terms of surrender were, a group of us, consisting of my men, myself, Colonel Haskell, and a number of officers, agreed together that we would not go to prison, would cut our way through the lines some way or other, but we would not surrender to be captured and carried off. Then came the farther news, circulated from lip to lip, that we would be paroled under the terms of surrender that had been agreed upon.

When my men took charge of the captured Napoleon gun, the men of the company were turned over to the Confederate provost- marshal, but as soon as the surrender was over the Federal lieutenant who commanded it and many of his men returned to where I was. He was as hot as pepper about having lost his gun that morning, but he greeted me kindly, though at first he did not seem in a humor for talk. In a little while his temper improved, and when I turned the gun over to him, he had it and the caisson hitched up, put his men in charge of it and drove off. Before he left us he said he had been deceived that morning, having been told that the way was open to him. No sooner had he got in the brush than the Con- federate cavalry swooped down on him and got all around him, and he didn't have a chance to fire a shot before he and his gun were captured. We had taken the Yankee horses for the most part,