Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 39.djvu/39

 Confederate Gold. 27

self and the treasures of the Confederacy. The gold and silver of the Confederacy and that of the Richmond banks were loaded into wagons, and the President of the Confederate States, with his Cabinet Ministers, started South with it, guarded by three brigades of cavalry — Dibrell's, Vaughan's, and Dyke's. When we arrived at Washington. Ga., it became apparent to Mr. Davis that he could not with such a retinue escape the vigilance of the Federal cavalry, which was rapidly closing in on him from every direction, so the money kegs and boxes belonging to the Confederate Government were opened and the silver divided amiong the boys, each, without regard to rank, receiving $22.50, and they were granted indefinite furloughs. Mr. Davis and his family pushed on further South, and was a few days afterward captured by the Federals.

Meanwhile the officers of the banks sought the aid of the Federal commander to return their specie to Richmond, and from them obtained a permit and also a guard of soldiers to protect it on its return trip. Some of the officers and men of Vaughan's brigade became apprized that a train of specie was being carried North under Federal escort, and they jumped to the conclusion that it was the property of the Confederate Gov- ernment which the Federals had captured. They concluded that their four years of hard service for the Confederacy en- titled them to a share of this gold and silver, provided they could succeed in securing it from the Federal guard. With them the war was not yet over, and they acted upon the idea that anything is fair in war. They organized an expedition with the view of capturing this money and followed the train until a favorable opportunity of attack presented itself. They charged the train, captured and disarmed the guard, and pro- ceeded at once to knock the heads out of the kegs and the lids off the boxes containing the coin and to fill their forage sacks with ten and twenty-dollar gold pieces. Several of them got away with as much as $60,000; some were content with $25,000. and still others with less amounts, depending upon the carrying capacity of their sacks and saddle-bags.