"Terry's Texas Rangers"
The Campaigns


1
The late fall and winter of 1861, in Kentucky, was both wet and cold. Camp sanitation among Confederates about Bowling Green was as bad as imperfect medical knowledge and lax discipline could make it. Epidemic outbreaks began early and continued through the winter, scourging the Rangers with the rest. Men to whom the war had been an unprecedented lark were now sobered as comrades died with measles, camp fevers and respiratory infections. Hospital facilities, irregularly organized and staffed, were inadequate, and the sick overflowed into private homes in Kentucky and Tennessee. Others were transported by rail to hospitals at Nashville. According to a contemporary newspaper account penned by Ranger Chaplain Robert F. Bunting, by the end of January, 1862, eighty four Rangers had died, only five from enemy action. At no time during the winter months were more than half the Rangers available for duty.

At the same time they were being introduced to the war. No front in any real sense existed between Johnston and the Federal forces gathering before him. Inadequate Confederate cavalry was required to spread itself over an extended distance in which small groups of them, one or two companies or less, had occasional clashes with similar forces of Federals. These involved little bloodshed and merely whetted Ranger desire to get at the enemy in earnest. In a scout to Jamestown, Kentucky (called Jimtown by the Texans), Major Harrison earned their bitter contempt by withdrawing with two companies when confronted by a larger Federal force. The withdrawal was prompt, described by some Rangers as more precipitous than that, and Harrison was dubbed the "Jimtown Major" in consequence. Resentment of Harrison would get worse before relations between him and the command would improve.

True to Johnston's alledged promise, the Rangers were held unbrigaded as army reserve. In early December, however, they were ordered forward to Brigadier General T. G. Hindman on the Green River, where enemy movement was threatening. Sickness, leaves and details had depleted Terry's ranks for the moment to hardly more than two hundred and fifty men. Lieutenant Colonel Lubbock was ill at Nashville with typhoid fever. Harrison was either ill or on detail, and Terry's second in command was his senior captain present, S. C. Ferrell of Bastrop.

At Woodsonville, Kentucky, on December 17, 1861, going in advance of Hindman's infantry the Rangers charged skirmishers of the 32nd Indiana Volunteers to engage the enemy in their first stand-up fight at shotgun range. Colonel A. Willich, the federal commander, reported the attack in the following terms:

"With lightning speed, under infernal yelling, great numbers of Texas Rangers rushed upon our whole force. They advanced as near as fifteen or twenty yards to our lines, some of them even between them, and then opened fire with rifles and revolvers."

Hot though it was for the few minutes it lasted, the Woodsonville fight would have amounted to very little in Ranger recollection but for the death of Terry. His early death deprives the modern historian of a clear picture of his military personality. Through the years, however, comes the sharp impression that he was respected by men who demanded much of their leaders. One veteran, mourning his loss, ventured the conviction that in Terry was lost "another Forrest and veritable Napoleon of cavalry."

Ranger losses at Woodsonville was four killed and eight wounded. Willich counted eleven killed, twenty two wounded and five missing among the German-Americans of the 32nd Indiana.

2
The regiment elected Lubbock to succeed Terry. Then, on Lubbock's death at Nashville on January 23, 1862, the Rangers elevated Captain John A. Wharton to the rank of colonel and command of the regiment. Captain John G. Walker, who had received a bayonet wound at Woodsonville, was made lieutenant colonel. The regiment showed its continuing displeasure with Major Harrison, their "Jimtown Major", by ignoring his natural claims to preferment. Through the month of January, 1862, the Rangers remained with Hindman's Brigade in the vicinity of Cave City, being employed in small groups on reconnaissance and security missions. This period of Kentucky service came to an end in February, after Brigadier General Felix K. Zollicoffer's Mill Springs ( Fishing Creek ) disaster, January 9, 1862, followed by the fall of Fort Henry and Fort Donelson, February 6-16, 1862, wrecked Albert Sidney Johnston's extended Kentucky-Middle Tennessee line. With the rest of the army the Texans fell back through Nashville to Mississippi.

On this miserable march, made in snow and freezing rain, the Rangers covered the army rear from Nashville, through Shelbyville and Decatur, to Corinth. En route, Major Harrison again outraged Ranger sentiment by punishing two straggling and insubordinate soldiers by placing them on the Shelbyville pike and requiring them to mark time under guard. Comrades of the pair were furious at Harrison, as one Ranger said, "for presuming to treat two gentlemen so inconsiderately." With the help of a single lieutenant, S. P. Christian of Company K, Harrison was forced to beat down what would have been called a mutiny in any but the Confederate Army. He now became the "Mark Time Major."

3
The regiment relaxed at Corinth as Johnston drew his scattered forces to that place during March and early April. Regimental strength climbed as the survivors of winter illness returned to duty. Some recruits arrived from Texas, among them Clinton Terry, Wharton's law partner and the younger brother of their dead colonel.

A Ranger feeling of well being at this time was complemented by a conviction of their own superiority over ordinary Confederate troops. Some of this shines through in a letter written by Chaplain Bunting to a Texas newspaper:

"Colonel Wharton has authorized me to say that he will not admit amateur fighters into the Regiment and further, that the Government will mount no more men; but all who come mounted and equipped (or can purchase horses here) will be received for the war. This opens the way for joining a cavalry regiment that has seen perilous service and which already enjoys more reputation than any other in the army. We want none but Texans."

At the Battle of Shiloh, April 6-7, 1862, the Rangers were principally engaged on the left flank of the army, across Owl Creek, an area covered with a dense secondary growth of trees and thickets. In several charges during the two days, one or two of which were executed dismounted, they suffered casualties not justified by the meager results. On Tuesday, April 8th, the regiment covered the army rear as it withdrew towards Corinth. Disabled by a wound received on the 6th and supposing the fighting was over, Wharton relinquished command to Harrison, Lieutenant Colonel Walker being absent on sick leave, and proceeded ahead to Corinth.

It thus fell to the Rangers to be both at hand and under command of their "Jimtown Major" when Nathan Bedford Forrest, the colonel of the 3rd Tennessee Cavalry, assembled a scratch force to smite a reinforced brigade of Federal infantry pressing on the Confederate rear.

Holding his restless men in line, determined they should charge together on Forrest's signal, Harrison's own shouted order was "Now follow your Jimtown-Mark Time Major!" The nickname was never used again.

This charge, made through a belt of fallen timber, stunned and completely halted Federal pursuit on the Corinth Road. To Ranger annoyance, however, no popular account of the affair made it clear that only one company of the 3rd Tennessee accompanied Forrest into action, that the larger part of the forces involved were Texas Rangers. An account of the charge by one of these, the previously quoted Fayette County veteran, J. K. P. Blackburn, is of particular interest:

"Forrest ordered forward. Without waiting to be formal in the matter, the Texans went like a cyclone, not waiting for Forrest to give his other orders to trot, gallop, and charge as he had drilled his men. By the time the Yankee skirmishers could run to their places in ranks and both lines got their bayonets ready to lift us fellows off our horses, we were halted in twenty steps of their two lines of savage bayonets, their front line kneeling with butts of guns on the ground, the bayonets standing out at right angle or straighter and the rear lines of their bayonets extended between the heads of the men of the first line. In a twinkling of an eye almost, both barrels of every shotgun in our line loaded with fifteen to twenty buckshot in each barrel was turned into that blue line and lo! What destruction and and confusion followed. It reminded me then of a large covey of quail bunched on the ground, shot into with a load of bird shot: their squirming and fluttering around on the ground would fairly represent that scene in that blue line of soldiers on that occasion. Every man nearly who was not hurt or killed broke to the rear, most of them leaving their guns where the line went down, and made a fine record in getting back to their reserved force several hundred yards to their rear. After the shotguns were fired, the guns were slung on the horns of our saddles and with our six shooters in hand we pursued those fleeing, either capturing of killing until they had reached their reserved force. Just before they reached this force, we quietly withdrew; every man seemed to act upon his own judgement for I heard no orders. But we were all generals and colonels enough to know that when the fleeing enemy should uncover us so their line could fire on us, we would have been swept from the face of the earth."

Ranger dead at Shiloh included Clinton Terry, mortally wounded on the 6th. Among the wounded were three company commanders: Captain Rufus Y. King, Company A, Captain L. N. Rayburn, Company E, and Captain Gustave Cook, Company H.

4
During the remainder of April, the regiment performed routine cavalry chores as the Federals inched their way from Pittsburg Landing to Corinth. Then, early in May, General P.G.T. Beauregard, successor to Albert Sidney Johnston, killed at Shiloh, brigaded the Rangers with the 1st Kentucky Cavalry under Colonel John Adams as a senior colonel. This small command was ordered on a raid into Middle Tennessee.

Wharton disputed Adams' seniority and, possibly with good reason, regarded the latter as unduly reluctant to engage with the enemy. The two regiments floundered about Middle Tennessee for three weeks. In a single engagement of little consequence, on Elk River, near Bethel, Tennessee, on May 9th, 1862, Captain A. D. Harris of Ranger Company I was killed. Late in the month Wharton brought the Rangers out of the state, crossing the Tennessee River below Chattanooga and going into camp in the shadow of Lookout Mountain. Here they rested during the month of June.

At Tupelo, Mississippi, his headquarters after evacuation of Corinth on May 30th, Beauregard considered the problem of half-disciplined cavalry regiments and made a decision affecting the Rangers. On June 9th, he recommended the promotion of Colonel Nathan Bedford Forrest to Brigadier General and ordered the Tennessean to proceed with as little delay as possible to "North Alabama and Middle Tennessee and assume command of the cavalry regiments in that section, commanded respectively by Colonels Scott, Wharton and Adams."

Forrest reached Chattanooga in the third week in June. He found Adams' 1st Kentucky Cavalry going to pieces, the one year enlistments of its men expiring and its members not amenable to the new Confederate Conscription Act. Colonel John S. Scott, 1st Louisiana Cavalry, was senior to Forrest, whose promotion would be delayed until July 21st. In addition, both the Kentuckians and Louisianans raised the old objection to Forrest as a prewar slave trader. Major General E. Kirby Smith, commanding the District of East Tennessee, presumably with authority from Tupelo, resolved the problem by replacing both commands with the 1st and 2nd Georgia cavalry regiments.

The Texas Rangers, untroubled by social pretensions, accepted Forrest for the fighter he was known to be, as did their commander. On July 9th, the brigade left Chattanooga, heading across the Cumberlands to Murfreesboro, Tennessee, occupied by Federal Brigadier General T. T. Crittenden and upwards of two thousand men, these critical to the security of the Nashville-Chattanooga Railroad and Major General Don Carlos Buell's contemplated advance on Chattanooga.

At 4:30 A.M., July 13th, 1862, Forrest's Brigade, the Texas Rangers in the lead, struck the Federals at Murfreesboro in a charge of such stunning fury as to set a pattern in shock action during the rest of the war for both it and its commander. Colonel Wharton was wounded again in a fight which lasted well into the day, but the Federals were forced to surrender with twelve hundred men and much needed equipment, including horses for the eternally necessitous Confederate cavalrymen and a battery of guns.

Murfreesboro citizens had suffered badly during this first occupation by Federal forces. Confined in the local jail was a considerable group of local residents, one or two awaiting execution. These were released to their grateful friends and relatives. A Ranger story, told in after years, was that General Crittenden refused Forrest's offer of parole on the grounds he could not deal with a guerrilla. Forrest then turned him over to the Rangers to guard. By them he was allocated to two Texans of such villainous appearance and demeanor that within an hour or two, General Crittenden became infected with a suspicion that their purpose was to kill him. Reconsidering Forrest's status, he demanded and received his parole.

5
Forrest's operations in Tennessee continued through July and August, nonplussing Buell with a threat which seemed to endanger even Nashville and paving the way for a Confederate invasion of Kentucky in September. On August 29th, Captain W. Y. Houston, Ranger Company G, was killed in an attack on a stockaded bridge site at Short Mountain Cross Road, eight miles southwest of McMinnville.

In September Wharton took command of the brigade, Forrest being relieved to raise another command. He led the right wing of Wheeler's cavalry as General Braxton Bragg, now commanding the Army of Tennessee, and Buell, his Federal counterpart, raced in parallel columns for Kentucky. Major Harrison assumed command of the regiment, Lt. Colonel Walker, who had never recovered use of his arm after Woodsonville, resigning sometime during the same month. S. C. Ferrell and Mark L. Evans, senior captains, became acting major and lieutenant colonel, respectively, under provisions of a new Confederate statute providing for promotion by seniority and abolishing election to any grade above second lieutenant.

Wharton's entire brigade, including the Rangers, fought almost daily through September and early October, for the most part, however, in one, two and three company detachments over a wide front. After the battle of Perryville, Kentucky, October 7, 1862, the Texans were part of the rear guard which covered Bragg's tedious withdrawal from the state.

The Rangers followed the army back into Tennessee by way of the Cumberland Gap. Rations were short, and the march was made difficult by an October cold spell. They found it snowing at Knoxville. From Knoxville, they marched into Middle Tennessee, camping at Nolensville, fifteen miles southeast of Nashville. In forty skirmishes and fights in Kentucky they had suffered fewer than thirty casualties, but the count included Acting Lieutenant Colonel Evans, wounded on the 7th and left at Harrodsburg. In November they would learn from a chance Louisville paper of his death at that place.

In Kentucky, too, the Rangers crossed that significant line which divides new soldiers from old veterans. They had established the reputation which they would maintain for the remainder of the war, and they were as well known to the enemy as they were to their Confederate comrades. It was some sort of acknowledgement of their accomplishments when, it late November, Wharton was promoted to brigadier general and Harrison was officially promoted to colonel of the Texas Rangers. Captain Ferrell, who was absent sick, became lieutenant colonel, and Captain Rayburn, just returned from convalescent leave and still suffering with an arm shattered at Shiloh, was promoted to major.

6
December 1862, was the best month the Rangers had during the entire war. Though the Federals moved with energy after Perryville, and by now were massed about Nashville, facing Bragg on the Murfreesboro pike, the war was still new enough for the Texans to enjoy a momentary respite and a feeling of Christmas in the air. The previous winter had been one of sickness and discomfort in the Bowling Green mud, but December, 1862, was different. According to one veteran, the month was one "among the warm-hearted and hospitable Tennesseeans. Warm firesides, square meals, and the smiles of pretty girls made an Eden on earth awhile for the war-torn soldiers."

Towards the third week in the month the command was up to a strength of six hundred and ninety men, making it one of the larger regiments of the army at this period of the war. Ranger morale was attested by a high rate of wounded returnees, and a small but continuous flow of recruits from Texas suggest their reputation at home and in the field.

As December ended, Federal Major General W. S. Rosecrans moved out of Nashville and, on December 31, 1862, confronted Bragg just west of Stones River, astride the Nashville Turnpike three miles from Murfreesboro. In the battle which followed, called Murfreesboro by the Confederates, Wharton's Brigade, including the Rangers, went around the Federal right flank on both the 31st and the 1st, capturing over two thousand Federal prisoners and guns, wagons and other equipment in proportion. The Rangers were engaged with the enemy almost continually throughout both days, during which one experience with Federal cavalry confirmed their conviction that shotguns were superior to sabers.

Under the watchful eye of Colonel Harrison, they sat quietly in line as the Federal horsemen raced down on them, then scattered them into fragments with buckshot. On Friday, January 2nd, Wharton and the Texans fought with less success on the Confederate right then covered the Confederate rear as Bragg withdrew to Shelbyville and the Duck River.

Among the Federals who fell into Ranger hands during the Murfreesboro battle was Colonel A. Willich, now a brigade commander, whose regiment had slain Terry just twelve months earlier. Good humor at this capture was reflected in the kind treatment accorded the German born Federal, who was wounded, and Willich was quoted by the credulous Texans as having said he would rather be a private in the Texas Rangers than a general in the Federal army.

Some of the Rangers were convinced they had whipped Rosecrans by themselves, that Bragg's withdrawal from Murfreesboro was worse than unnecessary. In this they shared considerable senior opinion in the Army of Tennessee, though they overestimated their own part in the battle at the expense of their comrades in the infantry.

The Rangers sustained approximately fifty casualties at Murfreesboro. Wharton had established a novel command arrangement within the brigade for the occasion, dividing it into two fighting groups, plus a reserve. The first of these, the Rangers and two other regiments, he placed directly under Harrison. Harrison, in turn, relinquished command of the Rangers to Major Rayburn. This scheme apparently worked to Wharton's satisfaction, and he retained it as a normal method of handling his brigade. Major Rayburn's overtaxed strength, however, failed him at Murfreesboro, and he was replaced on the field by Captain Gustave Cook, who retained command until the return of Lt. Colonel Ferrell in March.

7
For several weeks in January, 1863, the Texas Rangers performed routine picket duties on the Shelbyville-Murfreesboro pike. Then, in the last week of that month, Wharton's and Forrest's brigades were ordered on a raid into West Tennessee under 'Fighting Joe' Wheeler. An attack on the fortified post of Dover, within the perimeter of Fort Donelson, was repulsed with severe loss on February 3rd. Both Wharton and Forrest had objected to the attack, and Ranger estimate of Wheeler suffered accordingly. The Rangers, however, were not centrally engaged in the assault, and one of them, young Sam Maverick of Company G, distinguished himself by swimming the icy Cumberland to set fire to what the Rangers called a 'transport', referred to in contemporary Federal reports as a barge loaded with hay.

Through the spring and early summer of 1863, the Rangers operated actively in Middle Tennessee and along the Duck River front, covering Bragg's army lying in and about Tullahoma, Shelbyville and Wartrace. Their service was active and creditable and, from most indications, more Federal trains, displaying more skill in the process than other Confederates given the same opportunity at other places.

In March, Wharton became a division commander in Wheeler's newly formed cavalry corps, and Harrison took command of his old brigade. Both men, however, would have a long wait before elevation to appropriate rank. Lieutenant Colonel Ferrell returned to duty about the same time and commanded the Rangers until late May or early June. He then resigned. Rayburn, apparently, had resigned somewhat earlier, and this cleared the way for field assignments in the regiment which would obtain during the remainder of the war: Major Gustave Cook, promoted to lieutenant colonel, took command of the regiment; Captain S. P. Christian, promoted to major, became acting lieutenant colonel; Captain William R. Jarmon, commanding Company F and senior captain, became acting major. All three men would eventually be promoted to appropriate grade.

In June and July, Rosecrans maneuvered Bragg out of Tennessee all the way back to Chattanooga, and the Rangers fell back with the army. About mid-July, they went into camp on Silver Creek, in Floyd County, Georgia. Here they recruited their strength and for two months gave themselves over to such diverse activities as barbecues, a protracted religious revival, and organization of a Masonic lodge. The whole happy period was highlighted by a grand festival on August 5th at which a thoroughbred horse and a one-thousand dollar saddle, all bought by Ranger subscription, was presented to General Wharton. During the barbecue which followed this presentation Wharton, not always tactful in speech, angered the Georgians present by referring to Tennesseeans as the people for whom he would rather fight than anyone except Texans. This affair was followed by a ball at nearby Rome, Georgia, attended by those of the Rangers not dissuaded by currently revived religious objections, plus, as someone noted, all the pretty girls in North Georgia.

8
Rested and in good spirits, the Texans numbered four hundred and twelve men as they were ordered to work in the closing days of August. Rosecrans was moving across the Cumberlands. His army began crossing the Tennessee at Stevenson and Bridgeport, Alabama, and in the first two weeks of September the Rangers obstructed passes through the Lookout Mountains, skirmishing daily with the Federal troops.

On the 19th, they sideslipped behind the army to move onto the Federal right on Chickamauga Creek. On the way they met Longstreet's incoming corps of the Army of Northern Virginia. Among these were the Texans of Hood's old brigade. Old friends and kinfolk greeted each other, and the famous infantrymen of Lee's army examined with professional eyes the only command outside Hood's Brigade they considered as good as themselves.

With Wheeler's entire division, the Rangers operated on the 19th and 20th in the vicinity of Crawfish Springs and Lee and Gordons Mills, being part of the those Confederate forces which turned the Federal right and followed the withdrawing enemy to Chattanooga. The twenty casualties taken by the Rangers at Chickamauga was a modest enough price for those inflicted on the enemy. On the 20th they killed, wounded and captured one hundred thirty six members of the cavalry brigade of Federal Brigadier General George Crook, including one regimental commander mortally wounded.

Following Chickamauga the Texas Rangers were kept busy for a few days doing outpost and other cavalry duties, then they went with Wheeler on a raid into Tennessee and the Federal rear. Crossing the Tennessee River on October 1st, they went on a destructive course to McMinnville, where they captured and burned enormous stores, then proceeded to Murfreesboro and beyond to the environs of Nashville. Coming out by way of Pulaski, they recrossed the Tennessee near Decatur, Alabama, on the 8th. This raid accomplished much destruction on the Federals, but it was done by continuous marching and fighting which cost men and horses and wore out both the Rangers and all other elements of Wheeler's command. Ranger loss was twenty or more killed and wounded, plus ten or twelve missing. Worst of all, both Lieutenant Colonel Cook and Major Christian were seriously wounded on October 7th in a sharp action at Farmington, Tennessee. Captain Jarmon assumed command of the regiment.

9
Routine service followed for a month, then on November 5th, the Rangers were ordered from Ringgold, Georgia, to Athens, Tennessee, from which place on the 11th they were assigned to Brigadier General Frank Armstrong's Division of cavalry, supporting Longstreet's movement against Federal Major General A. P. Burnside at Knoxville.

This took the Rangers from under Wharton's command, and it involved them in the futile effort to take Knoxville on the 29th. When it was over, they learned with the rest of Longstreet's men that Bragg had been whipped at Missionary Ridge on the 24th, and Sherman was between them and Georgia. They remained in East Tennessee through the winter and early spring, rejoining the Army of Tennessee, now commanded by General Joseph E. Johnston, at Dalton, Georgia, in April, 1864.

The East Tennessee service of the Rangers was the most difficult they experienced during the entire war. They went into it with worn horses and depleted strength. The weather was bitter, and no concession could be made to it. Longstreet's situation was precarious and his needs put excessive strain on all the cavalry of his corps. Worst of all, perhaps, the East Tennessee populace was Unionist, and the Rangers were eternally galled with the knowledge they were surrounded by enemies. During these months they lost fifty or sixty killed, wounded and missing, most of whom would never be replaced.

During their absence from the main army, Wharton had been promoted to major general and ordered to the Trans-Mississippi Department. Harrison's Brigade was now assigned to the division of Brigadier General Y. C. Hume. For a month the Texans rested at Dalton, receiving back a few of their winter wounded and trying to recruit their horse strength. Then Sherman moved in front of Rocky Face Ridge, and in early May the Rangers were ordered to the front.

10
Through the late spring and summer of 1864, they fought continuously. At Resaca and Cassville, they functioned as cavalry. At New Hope Church and Big Shanty they dismounted and were introduced to pickaxe and spade and the life of infantrymen in Johnston's army.

By July, Sherman was before Atlanta, and Harrison's and Ross' Texas brigades were sent to Newnan, Georgia, where they met and defeated a raiding column led by Federal Colonel E. M. McCook on July 30, 1864. This affair encouraged General John Bell Hood, who had succeeded Johnston in command of the Army of Tennessee, and in August, he directed Wheeler and his cavalry to raid in Sherman's rear. The Rangers accompanied this expedition, which went burning and destroying up the railroad through Marietta and Resaca to Dalton. Demonstrating against Chattanooga, Wheeler then headed for East Tennessee, reaching the vicinity of Knoxville before turning westwards towards Nashville. The Federals, however, concentrated their forces, and the Confederate cavalry was forced off into North Alabama.

In September, the Rangers were at Florence, from which place they groped their way back to Georgia and the army. Their raid had been destructive, but it was nullified by a sophisticated railway repair service available to the enemy, and in the meantime Hood had lost Atlanta.

In late October, following some sparring with Sherman on the rail line north of Atlanta, Hood and the army started for Tennessee, and the Rangers were left with Wheeler to watch Sherman. They moved out on Sherman's flanks as the Federal commander began the winter and early spring move which was to take him through Georgia to the sea at Savannah, and then north into the Carolinas.

For months the Rangers skirmished almost daily, a few desperate men hacking at an enemy now clearly beyond the powers of any Confederate force to destroy. Sherman singled them out repeatedly in bitter complaint that they fought his foragers and 'bummers' to the knife. After the war none of them denied that with bitter hearts they left nothing undone of which they were capable to narrow Sherman's trail of destruction through Georgia.

On March 19, 1865, they formed as a regiment and made their last charge of consequence at Bentonville, North Carolina. Here they lost wounded Colonel Cook, Lieutenant Colonel Christian and Major Jarmon. Captain J. F. 'Doc' Matthews of Company K took command of the Rangers for the few weeks left in the war.

In April the Confederate army lay at Goldsboro, North Carolina, Johnston again in command, while a surrender was negotiated. Captain Matthews, not without encouragement from his superiors, turned each company back to its commander with authority to surrender or leave as it saw fit. On the day before the surrender the command counted two hundred forty eight men present for duty. At the surrender, April 26, 1865, Captain Tom Weston, Ranger Company H, commanded ninety members of the regiment to represent what remained in the field of the
8th Texas Cavalry, Terry's Texas Rangers.

These accepted their paroles and turned their faces to follow those of their comrades already headed back to Texas.

 

 

Text by Mel Wheat



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