18/12/2024
It’s been a few days since the reenactment of the Battle of Fort McAllister, but I wanted to relay a tale as I first heard it. I shared it with a good many folks that passed through the fort over the weekend, and as many of my comrades that cared to give listen.
‘A Free Ride Home’ as told by Luther Thrift (Okefenokee Storyteller and one of the last real swampers that ever lived)
“In the fall of 1863, young Jim Hendrix left his home at the edge of the Okefenok Swamp and enlisted in the Confederate Army. He along with several other teenage boys from Charlton County traveled to Savannah where they joined the 22nd Battalion, Georgia Heavy Artillery. In December of ‘64 Jim was serving in Company E under Captain Christopher Hussey, when General Sherman’s men attacked Fort McAllister. After the fall of the fort, Jim along with the rest of his unit was captured. That night they were quartered in large tents and a guard was posted at each one. Shortly after their capture Jim heard a yankee say that all the prisoners would be shot the next day. His comrades alleged that this was only a rumor and a form of harassment by the yankees. Nevertheless young Jim was vexed terrible. It was after midnight and all in the tent were asleep but Jim. Quietly and cautiously the youngster peeped through the door flaps of the tent to get a look at the situation outside. The yankee soldier guarding their tent was leaning on his musket with his head down, slumped over. Jim quickly decided this might be his only chance of escape. He scurried under the back of the tent and ran pell-mell toward the adjacent woods. After reaching the woods he continued traveling at break neck speed through the dark, though he could hear no sound of pursuers. He ran several miles before collapsing in total exhaustion. Shortly after daybreak, Jim awoke to the sound of horse’s hooves coming towards him. Peering through the brush he saw a riderless horse walking along a nearby path with bridge and saddle on. With easy talking and calm maneuvering, Jim soon apprehended the animal. He instantly recognized the horse tack as that of federal cavalry. Thinking his situation to be providential, Jim mounted the horse and turned him in a southwest direction and headed for the Okefenok where was his home. After several days of hard riding, young Jim arrived in Charlton County. The swamp was his sanctuary until the war ended a few months later. The commandeered cavalry mount later proved to be a good buggy and plow horse. After the war, most confederate soldiers returned South by walking, but James Daniel Hendrix rode home at the expense of the Yankees.”
In the midnight darkness nearly 160 years to the day, I walked among the trees and cabbage palms thinking back on a man cut from the same cloth as I, scuddling about in the same woods all those many years ago.
