Connecting the Shots: 1861-1865

Anderson Intelligencer, May 30, 1900

 Could the same man have fired the first and last shots of the Civil War? That's the implication of some recently unearthed newspaper clippings. 

 The Anderson Intelligencer of May 30, 1900, reprinted a story from the Greenville Mountaineer, signed anonymously by "Old Coins," who interviewed eyewitnesses to the skirmish in his quest to document the last "battle" of the Civil War, which involved Stoneman's raiders on May 1, 1865—three weeks after Robert E. Lee's surrender in Virginia. The clipping quotes Butler Dyer of Piedmont:

Mr. Paul Allan, of Charleston, was one of the Citadel cadets and who was the man who fired the first shot of the war on the steamer "Star of the West," was also a member of this company, and fired the last shot at the enemy on this occasion, thus having the somewhat remarkable experience and distinction of having inaugurated and finished the sanguinary conflict of '61 to '65.

 The Bamberg Herald of May 19, 1921, carried an account from the Greenville News, where the skirmish was documented by Louise Vandiver (1865-1938), who authored the Traditions and History of Anderson County in 1928. 

Among the Confederate party was young man named Paul Allen, a Charlestonian, who, it is said, fired the first shot at the Star of the West, having been a Citadel cadet at the time, and who, just to complete his record in a satisfactory manner, fired the last shot at the retreating Federal cavalry in this final skirmish on the lonely road away off in Anderson county, ending, as he had begun, one of the greatest wars in all of history. 

 Mrs. Vandiver goes on to identify Andersonians who were part of that skirmish, including James L. Dean, D.S. McCullough, F.A. Silcox, J.B. Lewis, G.W. Sullivan, and E.A. Smyth. Ellison Adger Smyth became the founder of the mill town of Pelzer, and this confirms our previous reporting that Smyth was involved in the skirmish. 

 Smyth (1847-1942) also claimed to have witnessed the first shot on Fort Sumter, and he later helped make Greenville the "Textile Capital of the World." Sullivan (1847-1928) later became mayor of Williamston, which may account for the "Confederate Skirmish" historical marker being erected in that town. John Baylis Lewis (1848-1929) became an Anderson businessman. 

 The Stoneman Gazette previously reported how a Georgia man who wound up in the custody of Stoneman's Raiders boasted of loading the first gun fired at Fort Sumter. 

 Here is the entire clipping from the Anderson newspaper:

 

From Concord to Conquered

Commemorating the 1875 centennial of the original 'Shot Heard Round the World,' this Minuteman statue in Lexington, Massachusetts, was cast in bronze from melted-down Civil War cannons. The young sculptor was Daniel Chester French, who in 1920 gave us the great statue of Abraham Lincoln, sitting in the Lincoln Memorial. 

CONCORD, Massachusetts

 April 19, 2025, will mark the semiquincentennial of Battle of the Old North Bridge. The American Revolution began on that date back in 1775, when about 400 Patriot minutemen routed 100 British Redcoats.

 To mark the occasion in 1837, Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote the Concord Hymn, where the frontier skirmish was immortalized as "The Shot Heart Round the World." Emerson could see the old bridge from his "manse" along the Concord River.

 The Concord Hymn became a template for the Conquered Banner, written by Confederate chaplain Father Abram Joseph Ryan to remember those who served under the Stars and Bars. The Conquered Banner is quoted on Confederate monuments in Greenville, Anderson, and Abbeville—towns which were landmarks for Stoneman's Raid during the pursuit of Confederate president Jefferson Davis. 

 Emerson's line about the shot heard round the world has also been applied to the bombardment of Fort Sumter at the start of the Civil War. The Georgia soldier who claimed to have loaded that shot wound up as a captive of Stoneman's Raid:  "You Are the Man Who Caused All This Trouble?" 

 Tyranny is timeless, whether it is imposed by King George III or King Cotton. Confederates justified their 19th-century rebellion against the United States with grievances draped in their forefathers' patriotism—while side-stepping the Jeffersonian ideal that "all men are created equal."

 Other milestones in Stoneman's Raid which echo the American revolution: 

 Remember When N.C. Voted to Save the Union?  As we deal with a polarizing presidency and a fractured society, here's a refreshing history lesson about true patriotism and the rule of law.

   Hunting Jefferson Davis to the Ends of the Earth: The pursuit of Jefferson Davis intersected several Revolutionary War sites, including Cowpens, S.C. 

   Reasons for the War? How Quickly They Forget: Confederate leaders left no doubt that slavery was the reason for secession. 

   Tear it Down? Or Can We Reconcile With It? A case study from Anderson, S.C.,  reveals how we might deal with Confederate monuments.

 Greenville Mule Gets Yankee's Goat: The daughter of a Revolutionary hero, Capt. Billy Young, saw one of Stoneman's Raiders humiliated. 

   Abraham Lincoln and the Horn of Freedom: Speaking of anniversaries, this summer will mark the 74th season of Horn in the West, an outdoor drama in Boone, N.C., that interprets the American Revolution through the legend of Daniel Boone. Horn will be on a limited schedule this summer, while the theater undergoes renovations.

Civil War hooks in my new book

Order at McFarlandBooks.com/LeConte-Lodge

 McFarland Books recently published LeConte Lodge / A Centennial History of a Smoky Mountain Landmark, which has been a three-year project with my former newspaper colleague, Mike Hembree. 

 Somebody asked me, "What's your next book? The Civil War?"
 I have considered turning The Stoneman Gazette into a book (since Google's blogspot platform will not last forever). 

 But there are Civil War tales in the new book. Joseph Le Conte, whose family name adorns Mount Le Conte, evidently visited Alum Cave searching for nitre, the raw ingredient in gunpowder. His pro-slavery sentiments complicate his legacy.

 Before LeConte Lodge was built, the highest inn in eastern America was the Cloudland Hotel atop Roan Mountain. It was built by Gen. John T. Wilder, a Union officer whose "Lightning Brigade" made a decisive stand in the 1863 Battle of Chicakmauga. 

 Uncle Ike Carter, who was 75 when he visited the tent camp that became LeConte Lodge in 1925, was one of the first to scale Mount Le Conte. Carter told photographer Dutch Roth that he first made the hike as a boy before the Civil War.

 Samuel Simcox, an English immigrant who worked on railroads during the Civil War, became the oldest man to climb Le Conte when he made the hike at age 80 in 1927. (The record is now 93, by Rufus Morgan). 

 I haven't been able to connect any of these individuals with Stoneman's Raid. It's likely that the raiders would have had a view of Mount Le Conte in March 1865 as they departed Knoxville via Strawberry Plains and Morristown en route to North Carolina.

 Mike has another book on the way, Petty vs. Pearson,  a chronicle of NASCAR's defining rivalry. In the last days of the war, Stoneman's Raiders passed through Spartanburg, Pearson and Hembree's hometown; and Greensboro, 20 miles from Petty Enterprises. I glanced at their genealogies, hoping to find if their rivalry might go back to the Late Unpleasantness. But I didn't find any Civil War veterans in their family trees. 

–Tom Layton