Sunday, December 30, 2012

"Texas Lament"


        A decade and a half had passed since the war for the possession of Texas and its border. The Henry family had traveled the vast breadth of the state to return to Samuel’s family home in Nacogdoches County and sent the eldest son, Thomas, off to West Point to become something greater than a ranger or farmer like his father and grandfather. James, unlike his older brother, decided that staying on the farm would give him the greatest experience and opportunity to buy and sell cattle for the rest of his life. He was just old enough to begin learning how to push a plow with a horse or the trusty old gray mule but he had been helping with the harvest every year. Samuel and Nora had worked hard to restore the farm to its former glory. Some of the fencing had rotted and the wires were twisted but at least the log cabin was built to last generations. A couple of years after Samuel left home, his parents fell ill in their early-mid forties.  In most parts of the country and in Europe, the affliction was known as “white plague” but in the south, it is well known as consumption. They both died within a year and were buried beside one another under a row of tall pine trees at the edge of the farm.

        At present, Samuel Henry remains a Texas Ranger Captain and has a reputation as an unmerciful lawman as well as having a pivotal role in turning the tide against the Mexicans all those years ago. However, he is on the verge of retirement when he’s called upon once more. The year is 1862 and the country is engrossed in the beginnings of war and eleven states have already withdrawn from the United States of America and formed their own republic, the Confederate States of America.  Since the election of Abraham Lincoln two years prior, abolitionists in the North and South have come forward to advocate for slavery to be outlawed. The Rangers had received reports that an underground railroad had been constructed on the Rio Grande to move runaway slaves to Mexico and to their freedom. Samuel left East Texas within a week on a trip that would take many months by one horse alone. While visiting the trading post in Nacogdoches, Nora had heard rumors of a Union blockade to keep food and supplies out of the hands of C.S.A. soldiers. Having shown genuine curiosity and concern as her oldest son is now an officer and having fought at Fort Sumter and Bull Run, she couldn’t imagine her son being without food or medicine and asked some of the traders if they had a way to get supplies to the soldiers. There was indeed a way by blockade runners and smugglers. Nora was more than willing to do her part for the sake of her son and future of her family.

        Late that summer, Samuel arrived near the Mexican border state of Coahuila and assumed command of operations along one-hundred miles of the lower river valley. He reminisced of his days in the war. A stampede of sombrero-topped, long-mustached men riding hard for the well-fortified city of Palo Alto and firing pistols while mounted on their Andalusian stallions. Samuel and his company of rangers patrolled the valley for a few weeks with no sign of any tunnels or smuggling operations. He had received a telegraph from his wife stating that during the Battle at Antietam in Maryland, their son had been killed in action.  It wasn’t until after the war when his remains were recovered and buried on the family plot. The only way Samuel knew how to deal with the loss of his son was to dedicate all of his efforts to finding that reported underground railroad. He met with a fellow ranger to discuss expanding the search lines further south and they both agreed to organize it as soon as possible. Having grown up working his own land, Samuel never understood why slaves were needed to do the work of lazy and greedy men. He believed in the promise of freedom on which the United States was built upon and he realized that the secession and escalating war was due to the existence of the abolitionists.

        One day while tracking down a lead that a tunnel may be nearby, Samuel spotted a covered wagon traveling down a small trail flanked on either side by multitudes of cacti and mesquite shrubs. He and a fellow ranger, his senior, approached the wagon and asked the driver to stop his horses. The driver saw their badges and guns and quickly retaliated by drawing his pistol. The draw was too slow for an experienced Texas Ranger and Samuel put two bullets in his chest and gut. They dismounted their horses and walked to the back of the wagon and flipped the canvas up to take a look inside. What they saw were at least a dozen runaway slaves cramped into the wagon. Samuel saw a few children among them so he assumed at least some of them are families. He ordered them out of the wagon and form a line. The rangers working the valley carried several sets of chains and shackles just in case they found any runaways that they might return to their owners. His superior thought they’d be too much trouble because it was near dusk and they would be traveling in Mexican territory in the dark. It was much too dangerous to do even in daylight so he ordered Samuel to shoot them and simply collect the bounty on them later. Samuel never killed innocents, runaway or not, so of course he refused. He ordered him to shoot once more before drawing his own pistol and aiming for the child in the center. Samuel protested and punched the older man and knocked him to the ground. He drew his pistol and fired once, killing the man.

        Back in Nacogdoches, Nora is now alone. With the death of her son, absence of her husband and her youngest son now missing, her worries and grief dramatically age her into an old woman. Her only wish was to have her family at home through the dreaded and never ending war. She wished for the end every day but it seemed like the day would never come. After killing a man, Samuel fled back home as soon as he could to escape being hanged in Austin. He knew that someday, someone would come searching for answers and ultimately, searching for him and wherever he may be hiding. While riding into the coming winter weather, he decided that a name change would be the best option to keep his family safe. Not leaving Nacogdoches, as most would consider that the best option. He couldn’t find it in his heart to leave his great state and flee to the North. If they were ever caught, it would be likely that his family would be hanged as well. He assumed the name of a fallen comrade he befriended many years ago. Ambrose Bennett would be his name for the remainder of his life. When he learned of James’ disappearance, he was heartbroken that he could never search for his son for fear of the authorities discovering his true identity. He and his wife spent the remainder of the war fighting off illness, hunger, and rebel bandits who had gone AWOL and steal from anyone they find.

        The war ended in 1865 with the assassination of Abraham Lincoln and the Emancipation Proclamation stating that all slaves are to be made free under the protection of a Constitutional Amendment. That amendment angered many southerners to such an extent that bounty hunters and vigilantes roamed the southern states hunting down anyone who may have aided in slave smuggling. The winter of 1867 was the harshest since the beginning of the war. The snow was deep that year and the air uncharacteristically cold for the aging Samuel and Nora Henry. He never told his wife why he retired from service so suddenly and perhaps he thought he’d blame it on an injury or claim to have been ill while in the valley. Early morning Christmas Eve, a trio of men on horseback arrived at the farm and offered the typical niceties to Samuel and his wife. It looked a bit odd and out of place to him but he was always ready if anyone ever came to kill or arrest him. The men got right to the point and asked if he was truly Captain Samuel Henry and if he was in Rio Grande Valley the summer and winter of 1862. Samuel asked Nora to go back inside but by then, the men had their guns drawn and aimed. He slowly removed his gun belt and threw it to the ground and stated he was willing to go with them. The three men dismounted and approached the middle-aged and gray-bearded Samuel.

        These men didn't look like the type he had served with in the past. These were younger men who obviously weren't from Texas, chewed tobacco and acted like the crazy savages he fought when he was a young man. As soon as the loud-mouthed man approached him, Samuel snatched his gun away and fired and raising his sights and killing another about twenty feet from him. The third man put a bullet in Samuel’s leg and scrambled to disarm him. He pistol-whipped Samuel until he was unconscious, leaving Nora to quickly run inside and grab a rifle. She shot at the last man but missed. He returned fire and didn’t miss. Nora fell to her knees and quickly collapsed in a heap. Contemplating about Samuel’s fate, the last man standing left him there in the snow figuring that was enough punishment for an ex-Ranger and went on his way as if he was the one defeated and driven away by the rapid fire of the Winchester rifle Mrs. Henry was wielding. 

                           ©Ashley Yarbrough 12/2012

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