At the time of the secession I was on the Union side. I argued against it. I told a gentleman, Garret Hall, who came to my house and brought the news that Alabama had went out of the Union, that she never went out with my consent. I adhered to the Union cause straight through.
When I heard that Vicksburg fell I was glad, also when Fort Morgan fell I was glad, and went that same day to the U.S. Army at Navy Cove. I was glad when I heard of the surrender of Lee.
Three of my sons, Asa 27, Samuel two years younger, and Joseph 21, were in the Confederate Army. I was opposed to them going in, but in order that they might remain at home I consented. They were pushed and would have been conscripted had they refused longer.
First year of the war I was farming in a small way and until the latter part of the second year, when I commenced making salt for myself and my neighbors. I left my wife and children at home and went into the US lines. I'm thinking September 1864 on the day Fort Morgan surrendered. I went there for protection. I had been threatened some and went to the Union lines chiefly on that account. After I left home they (the Confederate soldiers) threatened to burn my house. They robbed my house, stole my horses and took my daughter's jewelry. I was employed the third day by quartermaster Perkins USA. Part time building barracks, and part time oystering and fishing for the soldiers.
The army took thirty head of my cattle from my range above my house near the mouth of the Bon Secour River. They were driven to the mouth of the river and put on a steamer. I was at Fort Morgan where the cattle were taken and was present when the cattle were taken ashore from the steamboat. I forgot the number of the steamer but she was a tin clad sent from Fort Morgan by General Bailey who was in charge of the forces there. I went aboard her and saw my cattle. I counted them, there were exactly thirty. The other two belonged to my daughter and a man named Morrison. Two or three had been killed and split open but had not been skinned. I knew they were mine by the marks and brands. My mark was a crop and split in the right ear and a crop and a half crop in the left ear. They were also branded with a circle with an I inside of it on the hip and some were on the thigh. After I examined them on the boat, I went and met General Bailey at the foot of the wharf and told him the cattle, all but two were mine. He asked how I knew they were mine. I told him by the marks and brand. He then said he would see that I was paid for them as soon as the commissary came from New Orleans. My darky, Anderson, brought my mare to Navy Cove. General Bailey who was in command took the mare from the boy and sent for me.
He asked if the boy belonged to me? I said he did. The mare was standing in front of his tent. He then asked if it belonged to me? I said it did. He said he would take care of the boy and that I must take charge of the mare. I told him I could not do so as I was in the Quartermaster Department unless I turned her out to graze. He then said that would not do and he would take care of her himself until I left the service. General Bailey was assigned to Pensacola before the commissary came and I saw him no more.
When then troops left for Spanish Fort I piloted them some twenty miles to my place, where I spent one night at home and returned to Navy Cove. The mare was there with the commissary. I remained in the US service until about the 1st of May and went home. I never saw the mare again.
