Newspaper Page Text
As Gen. Sherman's Army Marched Into Central Georgia,
A Family at a Plantation House Prepared for the Worst. . .
Descendant Remembers Hearing Grandmother Tell the Tale
By CHARLES SALTER
Journal State Editor
JACKSON, Ga.—During her
youth, Mrs. Robert C. Ed
wards listened with fascina
tion each time her grand
mother told the story of the
family’s 10-day ordeal near
the end of the Civil War.
Mrs. Mary Buttrill Watson
had vivid memories of the
Yankee troops’ occupation of
the plantation house, Sylvan
Grove and the capture of her
father as he was trying to flee
to Macon.
The little girl was spell
bound hearing about the
Union general who brought
food to Mrs. Watson, an aunt
and two servants who re
mained in a heavily guarded
log cabin until Gen. William
T. Sherman’s vast army had
passed on its march to the
sea.
Mrs. Edwards, 72, the for
mer Annadawn Watson, a re
tired college teacher, has re
sided since 1942 in the three
story, 14-room house where
she was raised.
Now in the Jackson city
limits, the former plantation
house was built in 1830 by
Asa Buttrill for his bride,
Lucie, and eight generations
of this family have lived here.
Mrs. Edwards showed me a
beautiful silk shawl that two
slaves had woven by hand for
her grandmother’s 16th birth
day. She carefully turned
pages of an Episcopal prayer
book, printed in 1813, that her
great-grandmother, Mrs. Wil
liam Buttrill, used to conduct
worship services in 1815-1818
for the family and slaves in a
log cabin, Jackson’s first
Methodist church.
Today Mrs. Edwards stores
stacks of books and mementos
of her teaching career in the
first-floor room where a
Union general spent 10 nights
in November 1864.
At the request of her grand
daughter, Mrs. Watson in 1935
wrote in beautiful longhand
her memories of the Civil
War experiences at Sylvan
Grove. She died at the age of
99 in 1942.
(Her maiden name, Mary
Buttrill, will be used to avoid
confusion in references to
family members.)
Her story began Nov. 17,
1864, as Gen. Sherman’s army
advanced into central Geor
gia, and the Buttrill family
tried to prepare for the worst.
The previous night Mary’s
father, Asa Buttrill, loaded
two wagons with silk, other
valuables, food and clothing,
and left for Macon.
Her brother, Zachery Tay
lor Buttrill, and five other 15-
year-old boys in a Macon
cavalry company arrived at
the plantation that night to
eat a meal and rest before at
tempting again to learn what
route Gen. Sherman was tak
ing.
As they ate breakfast at 3
a.m. on Nov. 17, Sherman’s
approaching wagons were
heard, and the boys left for
Macon. Zachary and his uncle,
however, hid in an orchard to
wait for Mary, her Aunt
Emma Manley and two maids
—Martha and Mandy— to fin
ish loading a phaeton for the
journey to Macon.
Mary's father gave her the
phaeton and two black Ken
tucky horses, Sam and Henry,
when she graduated from
Synodical Female College in
Griffin with a degree in art.
Ben Drake, a crippled
Confederate soldier nursed
back to health by Mary's
mother, was to drive the
phaeton.
As Mary told her mother
goodby. about 500 Yankee
troops, wearing gray uniforms
to deceive the Georgians,
reached the plantation’s front
gate.
A soldier told the butler,
Stephen, to call his mistress.
When Mrs. Buttrill ap
peared, an officer asked,
"Madam, where are Forest
and Wheeler (Confederate
Cavalry units)?”
“I do not know, sir,” she
said.
The officer responded,
“Madam, don't tell me a lie.”
Mrs. Buttrill declared, "Sir,
I’d have you to know I am a
Southern lady.”
This remark abruptly ended
the conversation.
Mrs. Buttrill advised Mary,
Miss Manley and the two
maids to be on their way, and
the Union troops filling the
grove were silent as the hand
some phaeton passed them
Near the Ocmulgee River.
10 miles from the plantation,
the carriage overtook Mary
Buttrill’s father on horseback
beside two wagons.
He continued toward
Macon, while Mary’s phaeton
proceeded a mile to the home
of Stephen Johnson, accompa
nied by her brother and uncle,
and the Georgians stopped to
eat lunch and water the
horses.
After lunch Mary walked
into the road, glanced toward
the river and was startled to
sec several hundred Yankee
troops on horseback.
Her brother and uncle fled,
and she pleaded with the
driver, Ben Drake, to take
Henry, a saddle horse, and es
cape.
“No, ma’am,” he yelled as
he jumped into the phaeton
and grabbed the reins. “If this
war ever ends, you’ll see Ben
with Sam and Henry drive up
to Sylvan Grove.”
Moments later the Union
troops reached the road
where Mary, her aunt and two
maids stood, and an officer
asked, “Madam, where are
those damned rebels that
were here with you?”
Mary replied, “Sir, they are
gone.”
Near where they stood, the
road forked, the north branch
going to Covington, the other
to Macon.
One of the maids, Mandy,
suddenly ran up the north
fork yelling, “Come back,
Master, come back and give
up. These men are shooting
everywhere. Come back!
Come back!”
The Yankee troops rode
several miles up the north
fork before realizing the maid
had deceived them.
“She surely saved her mas
ter’s life, for they were shoot
ing as they went, hundreds of
shots,” Mary would recall
years later.
The northern troops re
turned, and the women asked
for protection. A soldier
offered to help them.
“If you please, take us to
the highest officer you can,
and ask protection for us,”
said Mary.
The soldier led them on a
mile walk through mud in the
woods to the tent of Union
Gen. George E. Spencer on
the Ocmulgee bank.
“Our silk traveling dresses
were tom in shreds by our
walk through the woods,”
Mary said later. “Gen.
Spencer bowed kindly to us
and said, ‘Ladies, you look as
if you needed dresses as well
as protection.’”
She was to learn later that
Yankee troops captured her
father, Asa Buttrill, and
seized his two wagons on the
river flat near Nutting's
factory.
The soldiers also took her
trunks and packages, keeping
some items and giving the
rest to factory hands.
Gen. Spencer, who had been
watching, entered the house
and demanded that the cloth
ing be returned, but the work
ers denied having it.
Saying “it takes a rogue to
catch a rogue,” the general
searched the houses and found
the women’s dresses, cloaks,
shawls and other apparel and
loaded them onto a wagon.
Then Gen. Spencer told the
women to get into the wagon,
and he drove it himself to find
a house where they could
stay.
Within minutes they arrived
at a two-room log cabin,
where a Mrs. Fears, two little
children and an old woman
resided. The Fears family was
afraid troops would burn the
cabin if the women were al
lowed to stay.
The general said, “I will
burn it damned quick if you
don’t take them in.”
Gen. Spencer told Mrs.
Fears, “I will put a guard of
40 men around your home. I
will have the fire kept up day
and night. Your fowl in-your
chicken house and your two
fat hogs shall not be taken. I
will feed the two ladies and
their two maids.”
For 10 days the general and
his cook brought the four
women delicious meals three
times a day, and they won
dered why he was so kind and
what their fate would be.
After the Union troops cap-
WoSiSiji£jOHm/S£BASTIM
BACH
*/>■ S' \ I GERMAN COMPOSER AND
( V ■ MUS/CJAN OF THE !700's
I l I WROTE ABOUT3OO NON
>■ i I RELIGIOUS AND RELIGIOUS
7 } CHORAL PIECES CALLED
fpi ***% CANTATAS.
* f V :i. BACH MARRIED HIS
&§•,: /_ V COUSIN. THEY HAD 7
: : / ymCHILDREN BEFORE SHE
n* • DIED, a year later,
Mk he MARRIED A PRO -
!■■■! FESSIONAL^SINGER.
I CALLED COBS. THE
/ FEMALE IS CALLED A PEN.
THE JACKSON PROGRESS-ARGUS, JACKSON, GEORGIA
Georgia PBj
Rambler P 9
tured Asa Buttrill and seized
his wagons, they threatened to
hang him but finally let him
go-
Several times Mary heard
troops ride by the cabin and
yell, “That old white devil of
a judge from Jackson is dan
gling from a limb over the
Ocmulgee River.”
She thought he was dead
until one night at midnight
when she sat beside the cabin
window and saw an old man
approach and stand in the
chimney corner, then sud
denly drop a note into her lap.
Asa Buttrill wrote in the
note, “Dear Mary, they have
turned me loose after robbing
me. Knowing the country as I
do, I will go through the
woods back home to your
mother. I saw the advance
guard of Sherman’s army
coming and gave my watch,
chain and pocketbook to the
old man who is taking you
this note.”
Although she still was un
sure of her own fate, Mary
Buttrill was very relieved to
know her father was alive.
Back at Sylvan Grove,
Union Gen. Blair and his staff
took over the parlor of the
plantation house, and hun
dreds of troops with horses
and wagons pitched tents on
the grounds.
Mrs. Buttrill was safe in
her room, but the Yankee
troops destroyed everything in
the other rooms, throwing
furniture and clothes out of
windows.
“He (the general) let my
life work of art be destroyed,”
Mary Buttrill said. “The par
lor walls were covered with
my paintings, oils, water
colors and India ink.
“Not one left. My
mother’s loyal colored women
were in her room with her.
Mother looked out her window
and said, ‘Rose, it is snow
ing.”
Rose replied, “No, Mistis.
The men are upstairs ripping
open your pillows and feather
beds to see the feathers fly.”
The soldiers burned the cot
ton and gin house and killed
hogs, sheep and cows on the
plantation, and in Jackson,
Union troops burned the
courthouse, jail, mercantile
houses and farming imple
ments and took what they
wanted from houses.
From Jackson to the
Ocmulgee River, the soldiers
killed several hundred horses
and livestock and burned
wagons and buggies.
“While at Sylvan Grove,
they took from my mother’s
little 5-year-old adopted
daughter the only article she
had that had belonged to her
dead mother, a handsome
ebony work box fitted with
solid gold accessories,” Mary
wrote.
“Though Katie pleaded for
it, a rough man snatched it
from her arms, dashed it
against a tree, breaking it to
sp)’iters ”
The soldier put several gold
articles into his pocket and
walked away.
In the log cabin where they
had been kept under guard for
10 days, the women saw Sher
man’s army pass, and Gen.
Spencer, his buggy and driver
at the door, visited three
hours.
“We were so alarmed, won
dering what it meant,” said
The Story of
Sylvan Grove
Mary. “He gave us a beautiful
horse to get home with, and
when he rose to go, he offered
io shake my hand.
“And he said, ‘Madam, I
was captivated at first sight
Your aunt is the most charm
ing, beautiful lady I ever
met.’ He asked Auntie if she
would answer his letters. She
said she would.
“He wrote her for two
years, begging to come to see
her, sent her lovely books and
flowers, but he never won
her."
Soon after the general left,
a Georgian named Capt. Wat
son, wounded earlier in the
war, arrived in an ox cart
from his plantation on the
river to take the women
home.
“We gee-hawed for seven
miles over dead cows, horses,
DANIEL FORD SALES
OPEN
THURSDAY & FRIDAY 8 A.M. - 9 P.M.
SATURDAY 8 A.M. - 5 P.M.
sheep, goats, hogs lying in the
road,” wrote Mary. “At the
end of seven miles, we met
two Confederate boys who
were home recuperating and
had hidden out and saved
their horses and buggies and
were hunting for us
“They were Dr. Tip Wilker
son and Wiley Goodman. We
bade Capt. Watson goodby
with thousands of thanks and
were soon at home at Sylvan
Grove.”
Mary Buttrill was saddened
to observe the Yankee sol
diers had burned the barns,
cotton houses, stables, cribs
and fences, and they had de
stroyed all furniture except
that in her mother’s room and
the parlor where Gen. Blair
stayed.
“No beds, no cover, no
dishes, no cooking utensils—
all broken and lying in the
yard,” wrote Mary. “We had
no things to eat for the next
14 days except scraps of pota
toes picked up in the Yankee
camps by the faithful servants
and washed and roasted, and'
a little corn.
“The gardener, Uncle Mose,
dug dirt up from the meat
house ground, boiled and
strained it until he got a little
Here’s your chance to get a great deal on a Ford car or truck
Thursday, April 28, through Saturday, April 30.
This is it. 5400 cars and trucks must be sold in 54 hours. Why? Because they've been stuck
in bad weather in the wintry North. And finally they made it down here Now we've
got to move them to make room for even more new cars on the way So you can bet we'll
be wheelin' and dealin' to get 'em off our lot
We re staying open later during the 54-hour Ford Marathon
So come in while these great buys last.
You could get one of the best Ford deals of your life*
THURSDAY, APRIL 28, 1977
salt. At the end of 14 days an
uncle from Heard County
came with provisions. Friends
who had escaped the invading
army helped.”
Mary Buttrill learned later
that her brother, Zachery, and
the other five boys arrived in
Maci/fi to find the city in Yan
kee hands.
Zachery said, “Boys, yon
can do as you like, but no
Yankee will ever take me
alive.”
The six youths groomed and
rested their horses, then man
aged to ride safely out of
Macon and sped back to Syl
van Grove.
For two weeks members of
the Buttrill family sat by the
fireplace day and night and
took turns resting in three
chairs and a sofa that the
Union general spared in the
parlor. Asa Buttrill had come
home unharmed, and the
family was reunited.
Years later, Mary was to
write, “Our good servants
lived and died with us. A big
number of young men went
with Sherman’s army, but
after arriving at Savannah,
wrote back to father, ‘Please,
Master, send us money to
come home.’”
I ford
V
Pnoto—Chsnes Sai'er
MRS. ROBERT C. EDWARDS HOLDS SILK SHAWL
Slaves Wove It for Grandmother’s Birthday
gfre Atlanta journal Wednesday, Apr. 20, 1977