Civil War Stories

The Civil War, otherwise known as The War Between the States, or even The War of Northern Agression to us southerners, has produced a lot of interesting stories passed down through the generations. My now deceased cousin, who was a dedicated member of the DAR and UDC, gave me a folder full of documented facts and stories about our ancestors who fought in the Civil War. Some of the stories I had heard before, from my mother. If anyone is interested, here's a few of my favorites: My great grandaddy, William Jasper Thomas owned a farm that is now the site of Lockheed-Martin and Dobbins Air Force Base. When he went off to war, he left his wife, Martha Ann Elizabeth, at home with several small children. Apparently she was a very strong woman and managed quite well. One day she could hear the Yankees marching down Atlanta Rd., so she grabbed up her babies and put them on a horse and rode to her father's house. His name was William Marion Johnston and he had a farm on the Chattahoochee River, where he operated a ferry. I am told that the Johnston homestead still stands occupied today, although my mom tried to find it and never could, since things have changed so much. The road passing the homeplace is Johnson Ferry Rd. Somehow the "T" got dropped from the spelling somewhere along the way. Sometime after that, Martha Ann Elizabeth was again threatened by the Yankees, as they came foraging for food on her farm. The story is told that as one of the Yankees went underneath her house in pursuit of one of her chickens, she poured boiling water on his backside. I have a feeling he never got to eat that chicken. When the war was over her husband had to walk home, and the only way he survived was by eating dried corn from the cornfields, which he would parch before he ate it. He was never in good health after that, and family tradition blamed it on the corn. After he died, my great grandmother appointed my grandfather (Eli Thomas, who I named my son for),the overseer of the farm. He was only 16 years old at the time. She paid each of her sons $100 a year to help run the farm, and they made extra money by collecting herbs to sell to the local doctors. They also made caskets and took goods for other people to such distant places as Savannah and Pensacola. By the time Grandaddy was 26, he had saved enough money to buy a 300 acre farm and he built a house on the property for $200. That's when he married my grandmother who was 17 at the time. (In 1896) I don't know as much about my dad's side of the family, but I do remember one story about a relative who had fought in the war and hadn't been heard from for a while. When the war ended and he didn't come home, everyone assumed he was dead. Then about 3 months after the war was over, his mother and his siblings were sitting on the front porch and saw a man walking on the road toward the house. The mother said, "He walks just like your brother". And lo and behold, it was him! It seems that he had been a prisoner of war and had walked all the way home from up north somewhere. I'm sure there must have been some major celebrating that day! I always wondered why he couldn't have sent a letter or SOMETHING to let people know he was alive. Maybe he didn't even have money for a stamp...who knows? But at least there was a very happy ending to the story.