Samuel A. Lockridge, Civil War SCALAWAG

 

I meet a lot of interesting people doing research for historical fiction writing. Right now I’m working on a first draft of Valverde, a middle grade novel set in New Mexico during the Civil War. I’ve come across many colorful characters. The one who’s of interest to me right now is Samuel A. Lockridge, or at least that’s the name he was using when he was involved in the Civil War.  Born in 1829, he was known as William Kissane in the 1850s, when he was a partner in the merchant firm of Smith and Kissane in Cincinnati, Ohio. In 1852 Kissane took out an insurance policy on a steamship named Martha Washington and its cargo. Soon thereafter the ship, its cargo, and sixteen people aboard it burned, and Kissane was charged with conspiracy. He posted $10,000 in bail, then disappeared. Around 1855 Kissane reappeared in Texas, but by now he was known as Samuel Lockridge. He joined forces with William Walker, an American physician, lawyer, journalist and mercenary, who gave him the rank of Colonel in his private army. Lockridge contributed $40,000, a considerable sum in those days, to help Walker recruit and equip a private military expedition into Latin America. Their intention was to establish an English-speaking colony under Walker’s personal control, an enterprise then known as "filibustering." Lockridge took 283 “Texas Rangers” to Nicaragua in late November of 1856, and was able to help  Walker usurp the presidency of the Republic of Nicaragua. After a series of setbacks and several disagreements with Walker, Lockridge returned to Texas in August 1857. Soon thereafter, Walker was defeated by a coalition of Central American armies. The government of Honduras executed him in 1860. Once back in Texas, Lockridge joined the Knights of the Golden Circle, a secret Southern society that advocated the extension of Southern institutions into new territory. He was not a delegate during the Convention that debated Texas secession, but he carried dispatches from Howell Cobb, the President of the Confederate Congress. Lockridge joined the Fifth Texas Cavalry, one of the divisions in Sibley’s Army of New Mexico in July 1861 and became a Major. By that fall, Sibley's army was on the march. Their battle cry, "On to San Francisco!" showed their intention to take New Mexico as a stepping stone to the gold fields of Colorado, and the ports and gold of California. If Sibley would have succeeded, the Confederate States might have had the the prestige they needed to gain European allies and the capital to support their army better.  A few nights before the Battle of Valverde, Lockridge was sitting around a campfire with his men, and one of them sang “The Homespun Dress,” a Confederate song about how much a southern woman would be willing to sacrifice for the cause. Lockridge bragged that he was going to pull down the Union flag from Fort Craig. He said that if he could get a wife as easily as he was going to get the flag, then he would never sleep by himself again, and he planned to make a dress out of the flag to present to his wife. On February 21, 1862 at the battle of Valverde, Lockridge led an assault on a battery of Union artillery. He and his men managed to cross the 800 yards between the Confederate line and the guns. He laid his hand on the muzzle of one of the cannons and shouted “This one is mine!” before being shot dead. THE HOMESPUN DRESS  by Carrie Belle Sinclair  (born 1839)  Oh, yes, I am a Southern girl, And glory in the name, And boast it with far greater pride  Than glittering wealth and fame.  We envy not the Northern girl Her robes of beauty rare,  Though diamonds grace her snowy neck  And pearls bedeck her hair.  CHORUS: Hurrah! Hurrah! For the sunny South so dear; Three cheers for the homespun dress The Southern ladies wear!  The homespun dress is plain, I know, My hat's palmetto, too; But then it shows what Southern girls For Southern rights will do.  We send the bravest of our land To battle with the foe,  And we will lend a helping hand-- We love the South, you know CHORUS  Now Northern goods are out of date; And since old Abe's blockade,  We Southern girls can be content With goods that's Southern made.  We send our sweethearts to the war; But, dear girls, never mind--  Your soldier-love will ne'er forget The girl he left behind.-- CHORUS  The soldier is the lad for me-- A brave heart I adore;  And when the sunny South is free, And when fighting is no more,  I'll choose me then a lover brave From all that gallant band;  The soldier lad I love the best Shall have my heart and hand.-- CHORUS  The Southern land's a glorious land, And has a glorious cause;  Then cheer, three cheers for Southern rights, And for the Southern boys!  We scorn to wear a bit of silk, A bit of Northern lace,  But make our homespun dresses up, And wear them with a grace.-- CHORUS  And now, young man, a word to you: If you would win the fair,  Go to the field where honor calls, And win your lady there.  Remember that our brightest smiles Are for the true and brave,  And that our tears are all for those Who fill a soldier's grave.--CHORUS       from  http://www.civilwarpoetry.org/confederate/songs/homespun.html Samuel Lockridge is one of the real characters that plays a part in Jennifer Bohnhoff's novel Where Duty Calls, book one in the Rebels Along the Rio Grande Series of historical novels suitable for middle grade through adult readers.  Jennifer Bohnhoff is an author and novelist who lives in the mountains of central New Mexico.  You can read more about her here.

Good inspiration for bad times

 

The view out my front door.

It’s snowing outside: lovely flakes that are just now sticking to the road and making me hopeful for a two hour delay tomorrow. (Note: Us teachers NEVER wish for a snow day; those have to be made up. We fervently wish for a two hour delay, because most of us know we can just talk a little faster and get the same amount of work out of our wiggly 7th graders. It’s a win-win.)

I have the flu right now. Yesterday I had chills and fever and stayed in bed, covered with every blanket in the house, for most of the day.

For most people, snow and the flu are bad things. For a writer, they’re just that more inspiration.

Right now I’m working on my Civil War Novel set in New Mexico, and one of my main characters, Jemmy Martin, is enroute between San Antonio and El Paso with General Sibley’s 3,200-man Army of New Mexico. Jemmy is a packer, a civilian who was hired at $1.25 a day to manage the army pack trains that carried ammunitions and rations because enlisted men either would not or could not properly learn to pack. (Very few packers ever got paid, and when they did, it was in worthless Confederate scrip.)

 Jemmy’s huddled with other men around a fire made with green mesquite. The thorns keep puncturing his benumbed fingers and the saddle blanket around his shoulders isn’t keeping out the cold or the blowing snow, but he’s better off than a lot of soldiers. Because he rides with the pack train, Jemmy has access to the tents and blankets and food supplies. Many a soldier’s diary complains about stopping for the night far from where the train stops and having nothing more than what they had carried.


Sibley lost about 500 men during this 500 mile march. While some men were transferred or deserted, the majority of the loses came from small pox, measles, and pneumonia. Having the chills makes me think that perhaps I need to write a “sick scene” into my novel. Although flu isn’t mentioned in Civil War accounts, it is entirely possible that some of the other diseases, most notably black measles, could have been the flu.


So I sit here, feet up on the hearth, a fire roaring, drinking spiced cider and thinking up mean scenarios to put poor Jemmy Martin through. Cold. Snow. Disease. Poor Jemmy better pray we don’t have an earthquake here. Neither he, nor my historical novel, would like that.

Henry Hopkins Sibley: Would be conqueror of New mexico

 

This is National Novel Writing Month, and I’m participating by writing a novel set in New Mexico during the Civil War. Today I got to a scene in which one of my characters, a young Texan named Jemmy Martin, sees Major General Henry Hopkins Sibley riding into San Antonio with his adjutants:

"At their center was a fine looking man with silver hair that caught the morning sun and made him look as if a halo circled his head. He had a great, bushy mustache, sideburns, and sad, drooping eyes that made Jemmy feel as if this man had seen all the sorrow the world had to offer and had learned how to push through it. Jemmy instantly felt as if he could follow the man anywhere."

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Many young men of the Confederacy were awestruck by Sibley. Many contemporary records attest to his natural charisma and ability to inspire people with his words.

Born in Natichoches, Louisiana in 1816, he had graduated from West Point and become a career soldier. He was also an inventor, famous for the Sibley Tent and Sibley Stove, both used widely by troops in both the north and the south throughout the Civil War.

At the time of the outbreak of Civil War, Sibley was a Major stationed at Fort Union, in northern New Mexico. He promptly deserted to join the Confederacy. A diary of a Union soldier stationed in Albuquerque says that, while passing through in a stagecoach, Sibley stuck his head out the window and shouted “Boys, I'm the worst enemy you have!”

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Sibley was on his way to Richmond, Virginia, where he talked Jefferson Davis, the President of the Confederate States, into commissioning him as a brigadier general and authorizing him to recruit a brigade of volunteers in central and south Texas. Sibley’s plan was to march to El Paso, then occupy New Mexico, seize the rich mines of Colorado Territory, turn west through Salt Lake City, and capture the seaports of Los Angeles and San Diego and the California goldfields, all while living off the land. His battle cry, “On to San Francisco!” inspired 2,000 men to join his campaign. By early fall of 1861, Sibley had three regiments of what he named The Army of New Mexico, plus artillery and supply units, camped on the outskirts of San Antonio.

But Sibley’s plan did not go as well as he had hoped. One reason is that the population did not respond to his invasion the way he had hoped. During his Army service in New Mexico, he had seen that both indigenous New Mexicans and Hispanic New Mexicans disliked the presence of the American Army in their territory. He therefore expected them to support him with food for both his troops and his pack animals and horses. He was convinced that recent immigrants from the southern states would join his ranks. He also forecast that the Union troops in New Mexico would desert to his banner. 


He was right to an extent on two of these three groups; many Union soldiers with ties to the south did abandon their posts to join Sibley, and many citizens were Confederate sympathizers, particularly in the southern part of the state. However, while most Hispanics and Indians didn’t like the Americans, they truly hated Texans, and they considered Sibley’s Army Texan, not Confederate. The citizens of New Mexico had no intention of supporting an invading army of Texans.

Futhermore, Sibley had a little personal problem; Sibley drank. He drank so much that one of his officers later called him “a walking whiskey keg.” By the time the Army of New Mexico had reached El Paso, Sibley’s once brilliant speeches had become rambling, confused rants, and even the common soldiers knew that their leader was affected with a severe and recurring case of “barleycorn fever.” Halfway through the Battle of Valverde, Sibley turned the field over to his second in command and crawled into an ambulance, too incapacitated to lead. Sibley was not even present at the Battle of Glorietta Pass. While this battle, often called the Gettysburg of the West, was being fought, the General was nursing a hangover back in Santa Fe.

By the time the ragged remains of the Army of New Mexico had limped its way back to Texas, none of its embittered soldiers felt like Jemmy had on that first day he’d seen the General ride his horse through San Antonio. They had followed him into the wilderness, only to find that his grandiose dreams were nothing but a mirage.