The Lost Confederate Gold

Everyone loves a treasure hunt. Especially when it involves gold. The mystery of the lost Confederate Gold has been debated for about 150 years. It is believed that Confederate President Jefferson Davis left Richmond, Virginia in May of 1865 with what is estimated to be about $500,000 in Confederate Gold coins, bullion, and private Virginia bank funds.

Davis and his entourage and the majority of the gold made it to the town of Washington, GA around the middle of May, 1865. This is the point where the Confederate Gold gets lost and many theories abound as to what happened to it. Many believe that Confederate Naval Paymaster James A. Semple was entrusted with $86,000 of the Confederate Gold and him and the money virtually disappeared into history some time after he left Augusta, GA.

Another theory proposes that a gentleman named Sylvester Mumford, who was supposedly present at the last Confederate Cabinet meeting when the gold was divided up among the remaining members of Davis's trusted circle, eventually took it to England with him.

Another theory has the caravan that eventually headed back to Richmond with the money was robbed by local Confederate and Union forces still in the area and the money was gone with the wind after that.

One more theory has chief clerk of the Confederate Navy Department, Edward M. Tidball, that was with Semple for part of his journey, stopped somewhere along the way and they divided the money between the two of them. It is believed that Tidball then returned to his home in Winchester, VA with almost $30,000 of the Confederate Treasury Gold. It was never found and he left no clue as to it's whereabouts.

One of the last theories has the belief that there was no money left by the time Davis reached Washington, GA. The Confederate troops knew the cause was lost, most had not been paid in months and the gold was used to pay off the Confederate troops encountered along the route from Richmond to Washington, GA.

History In Black And White

On Mother's Day, I went to my Mom's house to help her celebrate her special day. I got there before everyone else and I walked around the yard with my camera in my hand just taking random pictures of some azalea bushes, my old basketball goal, a birdhouse my father had built years ago, and a few other things. My parents have lived in that house for 40 years. I was 8 years old when we moved in so that was the house I remember growing up in. That was the one thing I could not take pictures of was my memories. My oldest sister shared some of her memories of a red wagon and a death defying ride one of us took down the hill in our yard. Known of us could even remember who it was. The thousands of hours I spent shooting baskets on that goal, all so I could be a third string guard for Coach Stephens 9th Grade basketball team at Flat Rock Junior High. I was a History major at Appalachian State and I even went on to get my Master's Degree in History at Western Carolina. I poured over thousands of history books where all of the photographs are in black and white. My camera has a black and white mode so I took a few pics in black and white and that somehow managed to put my memories in perspective. My memories are in color but the history of that house is in black and white.

Calvary Episcopal Church, Fletcher, NC

Sometimes a great part of history is right in your own backyard and you never realize it until you stumble across it quite by accident. I was doing some research for the blog I did called "the Ghost Rider Of The Confederacy" and since the Church was only about 5 miles from my apartment, I decided to take a ride down there and take a look for myself. The church is located on Highway 25 in Fletcher, NC and the church grounds and cemetery are open to the public. Calvary Episcopal Church was organized in 1857, making it one of the oldest churches in western North Carolina.

Calvary Episcopal Church is a beautiful church with a huge cemetery with some of the most interesting headstones and grave markers that I had ever seen. While doing my research, I found out the church was built in 1859 and quite a bit of it burned down in the 1920's but the original bell tower had been left standing. The church was rebuilt after the fire, incorporating the original bell tower as part of the new structure.

There were several headstones that were shaped like a small log and those symbolized that the people interred there had been part of a Masonic Lodge called the "Woodmen Of The World". I also saw a headstone that had the symbol of the free masons on it. Some bore symbols of things I did not recognize and others were just very ornate.

The Church had a deep connection to the Civil War other than the ghost rider of the Confederacy. The Church had been used as a barracks for Confederate soldiers going off to war and also had been used as a hospital for both Confederate and Union soldiers. At the back of the church there are several monuments that were dedicated to some of the more important figures of the Civil War, including the Confederate President Jefferson Davis. I had never seen anything like that at a church before. It is well worth the hour it took to tour the grounds and the cemetery.

The Long Journey Of Walter M. Bryson And George Mills

Walter "Watt" M. Bryson had just returned home to Henderson County from Charleston, SC with his medical degree from the South Carolina Medical College (now called the Citadel) when the Civil War broke out. Bryson quickly joined the company of men from Henderson County that became known as the "Henderson Rifles" and was sent to Raleigh to train for battle. The Henderson Rifles were mustered into state service early in November 1861 and became Company G of the 35th North Carolina Regiment.

Bryson was promoted to Captain in April 1862 and at some point and time, his lifelong friend, George Mills, was sent to be his servant. The two men had grown up together from boyhood and now were sent off to war to defend their southern homes. Bryson's father, William Bryson, was one of the wealthier people in Henderson County and he sent young George off with the instructions to join the younger Bryson in Raleigh, look after him, and bring him home after the war was over. The first battle that was fought in was the Battle of New Bern, then the Battle of King's School House, followed quickly by the the Battle of Malvern Hill, and Bryson survived all of these actions with George waiting anxiously for him in camp at the end of the day.

On September 17th, 1862, Confederate and Union forces met at the Battle of Sharpsburg in Maryland and unfortunately, Walter M. Bryson was one of three men that the 35th North Carolina Regiment had killed in action that day. When Bryson did not return at the end of the day, George went searching for his body and found him on the field of battle with a single bullet wound to his head. A distraught George picked his friend up and took him to an abandoned farm house near the battlefield that night until he could figure out what to do. George eventually got the body to a train depot in Fredericsburg, VA where he procured a cast iron casket with some money he had found on Watt's body and sealed Watt's body inside. He then boarded a train that eventually made its way to Greenville, TN where he purchased a horse and a wagon with the remainder of the money and started the journey back to Henderson County to return William Bryson's son home from the war.

The rugged and perilous journey from Bryson's death to Mills arrival in Hendersonville, almost took ten months. Mills arrived back in Hendersonville at the end of June 1863. Bryson's body was buried at a Methodist church in Hendersonville and 60 years later, his body was reinterred at Oakdale Cemetery in Hendersonville. George Mills was present at both ceremonies. George Mills became a free man and he served in the Henderson County Home Guards for the remainder of the war and became active in the Confederate Veterans associations after the war. He was given a full Confederate pension until his death in 1926. The story of Watt Bryson and George Mills is about loyalty, duty, compassion, sense of honor and more importantly, a friendship that transcended the social customs of the times.

The Phantom Rider Of The Confederacy

This ghostly legend centers around The Calvalry Episcopal Church in Fletcher, NC. It is a place I have passed by too many times to count on my way from Hendersonville to Asheville and I always wondered if that old cemetery hidden behind the wrought iron gate had a story. The legend starts with two young local lovers having to sneak and meet at the old well at the church because her parents did not approve of the relationship. It was the 1860's and as the Civil War raged on, the young beau got called away to join Confederate General Braxton Bragg's Army of Tennessee. The parents would not allow the young couple to marry before he was sent away and the young soldier was killed in battle a few short months later. The young lady grieved herself to death within two months after learning of her boyfriends death.

As the Civil War wound down in the Spring of 1865, Union General George H. Stoneman came through the mountains of Western North Carolina seeking to put down any resistance from Confederate soldiers and supporters as part of Sherman's March to the Sea. He reached Hendersonville around April 23rd and as he moved down the Howard Gap Road into Asheville around April 26th, a young female rider on a Palomino horse appeared in front General Stoneman's troops. She had long flowing blond hair, and wore a white dress and a grey, Confederate cape that trailed down her shoulders as she rode. She beckoned Stoneman's men to follow her. Stoneman thought she may have valuable information on Confederate forces in the area, and he quickly ordered her capture. She galloped down the road with Stoneman's men in hot pursuit but they could not catch up with her. She led his Union forces into a a small ravine a short distance from the church and straight into a Rebel ambush. The Confederate soldiers were positioned on both sides of the ravine and 23 of Stoneman's men were killed in the short battle. The Confederate forces escaped with very few casualties.

An incensed Stoneman ordered the female rider captured and punished for her actions but the his men could not catch up to her. The Union troops got close enough to her to fire off several shots but the bullets seemed to pass right through her and she disappeared from sight. She has been seen many times since 1865 including by one of the Episcopal Ministers of the Church. She was always dressed in the same fashion with the white dress and the Confederate cape, galloping up and down the roads surrounding the church, waiting on her young lover to return from the War.

The Narrows at Green River Cove

This story about Western North Carolina history is more about a location than it is a particular historical event. The location is the Narrows at Green River Cove. The Green River winds through Henderson and Polk Counties in North Carolina and beyond I am sure. When I was growing up, the Green River Cove was at the bottom of this long, winding dirt road and had originally been settled by several families before the turn of the 20th Century and before the great flood of 1916, had been a thriving agricultural community.

One of these families that settled the Green River Cove was the family of Posey Henderson and he was just one of the great characters that my father knew. A lot of my summers were spent in Green River Cove fishing and hiking and exploring the vast wilderness. The Green River was not that wide at any point but the Narrows is these two massive rock formations on either side of the river about six feet across from each other and the waters of the Green River are funneled between these two rock formations on either side of the river. The Narrows are a Geologists dream as thousands of years of glacial deposits, erosion, and the forces of nature are still hard at work.

My father was a volunteer fireman with the Blue Ridge Volunteer Fire Department for over 30 years, starting in the early 1960's and eventually became a "lifetime member" and is honored on a plaque at the Hendersonville Fire Department in downtown Hendersonville. Early one Sunday morning when I was about 13 or 14, my father came to me and asked me if I wanted to take a trip down to Green River Cove to the Narrows to look for a young man's body. The young man had been wading in the water up above the Narrows and had fallen in and had gotten swept down stream. We had a lot of rain that summer and the Green River was very swollen. Searching for bodies was one of the more unpleasant tasks that was often asked of the local fire departments but it still needed to be done to help provide the families of the victims with closure.

Legend has it that the rapids were so rough at the Narrows that you could throw a full sized log in above the Narrows and when it came out the other side, the log had been so beat up and chopped up, it was the size of a match stick. It was a recovery mission but it was an adventure for me, something along the lines of Stephen King's "Stand By Me." One of my father's friends, a man named Gene, went with us.

Green River Cove is still a very rural area and it was some tough hiking along the river bank and when we ran into a tributary, we had to go through the water. We saw a few snakes and some other wildlife along the way. The hike took us about four hours and it was very slow going. I slipped and fell in one time but it was hot that day, the cold water felt good, and I dried off really quickly.

The Narrows was the most impressive, natural phenomenon I had ever seen. We got to within about a mile away and you could hear the roaring water of the Narrows. It started out as a low sounding roar and the closer we got, the louder it got. I remember asking my father "What is that noise?" His response was "Wait until you see it."

We finally arrived at the Narrows and it was so loud, I had to scream at my father standing right beside me just to be heard. I remember creeping up to the edge of the Rock without getting too close so I could peer over the edge of the rocks and down into the river. I was very nervous easing up to the edge and I just wanted to take a quick look. The water from the Green River was being forced through a space way too small for the volume of water. The rocks had been worn smooth from centuries of erosion.

The young man's body that we were looking for was found several days later. The body had snagged way up in a tree because the water level was so high. When the water finally started to recede, the body washed up in a tree. I haven't been back to the Narrows since that day but seeing the Narrows was well worth the hike and a day I will never forget. It was valuable time that I got to spend with my father.

Bushwhacking At Beaumont

The mountains of Western North Carolina became a hideout during the Civil War for deserters from the Confederate Army, scouting parties from the Union Army, and bands of thieves and marauders from both sides of the War. The local citizens in and around Henderson County, North Carolina did not have much in the way of protection from the criminal element that roamed the mountains during this time.

Beaumont was an estate built as a summer retreat in 1839 in Flat Rock, North Carolina by wealthy rice planter and slave owner Andrew Johnstone of Charleston, South Carolina. Johnstone was a part of the Charleston planter class that made Flat Rock home during the summer months in the mid 1800's to escape the oppressive heat of Charleston.

Six Union soldiers showed up at the front door of Beaumont on the afternoon of 10 June,1864 and announced that they were Confederate Scouts looking for deserters in the area. They demanded to be fed. It was a customary practice during this time to feed travelers and Johnstone ordered his servants to prepare a meal. The six men were acting suspicious and Johnstone was not at ease with their presence.

His eleven year old son Elliot was also very suspicious of their nature and he slipped into a room off the kitchen and loaded a pistol. He hid it to where it could be easily reached. After the meal was over, the six men prepared to leave, but instead four of the men drew their weapons on the elder Johnstone while the other two drew on the youngest Johnstone. As the shots rang out Andrew Johnstone was hit in the stomach by a pistol ball and he managed to empty his pistol but all of his shots missed their mark. One of the shots barely missed Elliot as he quickly reached his weapon and started firing with deadly accuracy.

He had wounded four of the men by the time he emptied his pistol. One of the gunmen fell wounded on the front steps where he died an agonizing death within minutes. Elliot grabbed the dying man's pistol and continued to fire, hitting the other two men as they fled from the house. One died on the lawn and they found another body in the woods beyond the house a short time later. Elliot managed to kill three of the six and the other three made their escape into the surrounding mountains. A search party was quickly formed by neighboring men but the other three soldiers were never found.

Andrew Johnstone was taken upstairs by the household servants where he died a few hours later from his stomach wound.

The Baxter-Erwin Duel

Elias Gibbs was an eyewitness to another historical event in Henderson County brought on by the politics of the Civil War and that was the duel between Hendersonville Attorney John Baxter and Asheville newspaper editor Marcus Erwin. Baxter was an ardent supporter of the Union and Erwin was a pro-States Rights advocate and the feud was played out in the mid-1850's on the pages of the Asheville newspaper that Erwin owned. The feud reached a boiling point one morning when John Baxter was sitting on a bench in front of his law office on Main Street in Hendersonville carrying on a conversation with a then teen-age Elias Gibbs. A horse and buggy drove up to where Baxter and Gibbs sat and a man jumped out and handed Baxter a letter and drove off. Baxter read the letter and in a fit of rage, tore the letter to pieces and threw it on the ground. He got on his horse, and tore off South down Main Street. The letter was pieced together by Gibbs and some other occupants of Baxter's law office and it was a challenge from Erwin to a duel with Baxter. The letter said that Erwin would be waiting at Vance Mountain at Saluda Gap. As per the custom of duels of the day, Dr. Edward Jones was acting as Erwin's second with Dr. W.L. Hilliard of Asheville acting as his surgeon. Terrell W. Taylor acted as Baxter's second with Dr. W.D. Whitted as his surgeon. At the command of "Fire!" Baxter shot first and missed. Erwin's shot hit Baxter in the right knuckle of his right hand and the pistol ball eventually ended up lodged in Baxter's right shoulder. Erwin had been vindicated with his "victory" in the duel and Baxter left Hendersonville soon after and moved to East Tennessee a short time later. Baxter's Unionist sympathies were much more accepted in the Union stronghold of East Tennessee.

The Civil War Odyssey Of Elias Gibbs

Elias Gibbs was conscripted into the Confederate Army and joined the 64th North Carolina Regiment in 1862 when he was 19 or 20 years old. He was captured by the Union Army in Cumberland Gap, KY at the age of 22 and sent to Camp Douglass near Chicago, IL at the beginning of the winter. Shortly after he was imprisoned, the Union Army offered him a deal in which he would be able to volunteer for service in the Union Navy and it would get him out of the Prison Camp. He was sent to Brooklyn, NY for training and his first duty was serving on the USS Powhatan in a blockade of the Confederate port of Wilmington, NC and his last duty was on the USS Tallapoosa on the Mississippi River from which he was discharged in January 1866. In Elias' own words, his Civil War career lasted "3 years, 6 months, and 11 days." He had the rare distinction of being a Confederate soldier and in the United States Navy. He was turned loose in Memphis, TN to find his own way home and all of it by foot. It took him several months to get home and I know that it is about a 9 hour car ride from Memphis to Hendersonville.

Private Greenberry Hughes, 3rd Confederate Cavalry, Company K

One of my Great Uncles, Greenberry Hughes, moved to DeKalb County, Alabama with his new bride to live with his brother, David Durham Hughes in the late 1850's, before the outbreak of the Civil War. He and his brother enlisted with the 3rd Confederate Cavalry at Lebanon, Alabama in August of 1862 for a period of three years. Private Greenberry Hughes of Company K was captured by Union forces led by Major General George H. Thomas in a skirmish near Charleston, Tennessee on December 28, 1863. He eventually ended up at the Rock Island Prison Camp near Rock Island, Illinois on January 20, 1864 after brief stops in Nashville, TN and Louisville, KY. The Rock Island Prison Camp became infamous during the Civil War because the doctors there used the prisoners of war to conduct medical experiments. Private Greenberry Hughes died on February 16, 1864 and the official cause of death was listed as "pneumonia." The POW's arrived at these prison camps with tattered clothes, very little in the way of shoes, and were expected to survive an Illinois winter with minimal shelter and not much in the way of heat. Private Hughes is buried in Grave #549 and the headstone reads "549, G.B. Hughes, Co. K, 3 Confed. Reg., C.S.A."

The Untimely Death Of Sidney Garfield Gibbs

My Great-Great Uncle, Sidney Garfield Gibbs, was killed in an accident at the Southern Railway Yard in the Biltmore section of Asheville early in 1916 when he was crushed by a railway derrick as it was being swung around on the tracks. He was working on the piece of machinery at the time and evidently no one knew he was there. His body was crushed beyond recognition and the way they identified his body was by a pocket watch that he carried with him. I have seen the watch and it had several diamonds in the back of it. The watch was virtually untouched due to the accident with the exception of a crack down the back of it that almost looked like a peace symbol. The face was uncracked and the diamonds were still intact. He belonged to a Masonic Lodge, the Woodmen of the World, and this watch had something to do with his association to the lodge. Sidney Garfield Gibbs was buried in the Refuge Baptist Church Cemetery and his grave is easily identifiable because his monument is the biggest in the cemetery.

The Legend Of Big Jim

The world's largest hog, who carried the name Big Jim, resided in the small community of Dana, North Carolina in the late 1930's and early 1940's. My Great Grandfather, Henry Clinton Gibbs, owned Big Jim from the time he bought him from a neighbor when he was three or four years old until Big Jim's death in 1944. The hog was a China-Poland breed of hog and was of average size until he reached about five years old. His size and weight then reached proportions never seen before in a domestic breed of hog. The hog grew to weigh 2,415 pounds, was 10' 8" long from the tip of his nose to the root of his tail, he was 8'10" around his body, and was 4'8" tall up to his shoulder. Big Jim's tusks were 14 inches long. All of these measurements were certified by the Kentucky Department of Weights and Measurements. I have seen the plaque and a family member is in possession of it.

My Father can remember my Great Grandfather hoisting him up on Big Jim's back when he was a small child and letting him ride him around. My Great Grandfather was talked into taking him into downtown Hendersonville to show him off one Saturday afternoon by a neighbor and Big Jim's career took off after that. My Great Grandfather took him on various County Fair circuits throughout the United States and I remember my father telling me that my Great Grandfather showed Big Jim in 43 of the 48 states before the outbreak of WW II. He charged 10 cents a piece to see him and if you guessed his weight, you won a prize.

One time when they were traveling with the J.F. Sparks Carnival, 8,600 people paid to see Big Jim in Jasper, Alabama in a weeks time. I saw a newspaper article written by a woman in Jasper, Alabama many years after this and this article was devoted to Big Jim, because even as a little girl, the enormous size of this hog made a lasting impression on her.

Big Jim was retired in 1942 because of the start of World War II and the rations that were placed on gasoline and tires and anything else that could be used in the war effort. Big Jim died in 1944 at the age of 15. A hog back then dying of old age was a story in itself but this hog more than paid for his upkeep. My family's claim to fame is the world's largest hog and it may be a good reason as to why I have always had a fondness for bacon. The whole story about the legend of Big Jim can be seen in Volume I of the From The Banks Of The Oklawaha by Frank L. FitzSimons.