Chapter Two

     Spies are hanged. 

     The words rested heavily upon the young man in his tent, thrown across his bed.  He lay first on his back, gazing up at the canvas so near his face, but this left him open and vulnerable to the hideous shadow of premonition, and so he turned onto his stomach.  Face hidden in the blanket, he heaved a great sigh and shut his eyes.  His muscles were tensed in a vain effort to take the weight off his mind, where duty and cowardice vied for his attentions.  Spies are hanged.  The abysmal words played themselves over and over in his mind, the dream still fresh in his memory.  But it was a dream, and nothing more.

     Finally he pushed himself up and stepped outside.  He stood for a moment looking around, surprised at the darkness—the dusk had hardly begun to fall when he withdrew to privacy.  A few soldiers lingered at the fires, and they glanced at him quickly, their eyes inquiring whether he, too, felt it.  He passed them without speaking, and they nodded one to another in understanding.

     “He’s had the presentiment, boys.  He knows he’s not got long.”

     He heard their words as he left them, and tried to harden his countenance.  Was this strange feeling what the boys called ‘presentiment,’ an eerie foreshadowing of death on the battlefield—or at the scaffold?  Surely not.  No…surely not.

     He was nearly there now—he could see the captain’s tent, standing out amongst the rest.  The regimental colors flew from a pole outside its door.  Squinting, he could make out the writing on it, telling of the engagements in which the 33^rd had proved its mettle.  Had not there been such a cloud on his mind, he might have smiled ever so slightly.  His was a proud regiment.

     But he did not smile.  His forehead creased as he came nearer the tent, tension climbing higher in his throat.  It was a sort of relief to see the captain himself emerge from it, and immediately the soldier’s footsteps grew quick.

     “Sir!  Excuse me, sir!”

     The captain turned.  A smile showed itself for a moment, but, as if with sudden remembrance, it clouded over and disappeared.

     “Private Parrott,” he said slowly as the young man straightened himself and made a salute.  “Have you made your decision?”

     The private hesitated, knowing that he had not made any decision.  “I have considered, sir, and…” His voice trailed away into indecisive silence.  He looked away, unsure of himself.

     “Private,” the captain said slowly, dropping his voice somewhat, “you know that I am in no way associated with this mission, and was only asked to select men best fit for active duty.  You did not make the first list; however a certain man declined my invitation, and I have asked you in his place.  Know that it will be not be counted against your patriotism or bravery to reject it as well—I sense the purpose of this expedition will not fall under your terms of enlistment.”  He tried a smile, but it was a nervous one.

     The soldier caught his meaning, but instead of fear he felt a sort of reassurance.  He could volunteer better for a mission knowing vaguely of its intended purpose.  It was this affirming of its gravity that strengthened his resolve and gave him his voice.

     “I have decided, sir,” he said, meeting the captain’s gaze.  He saw the deep concern in his eyes, and wondered dimly whether the man knew more than he let on.  The thought made him stumble, but he caught himself and said,

     “I…I will go, sir.”

     The captain’s lips pressed together in a thin line.  His uneasiness gave way to a dull sort of despair—the soldier could see his attempt to hide it.

      “Well,” he said lightly, “you have chosen like a true man.  Your orders are to dress in civilians’ clothes and, within the hour, make your way towards Shelbyville by way of Wartrace Road.  You will be met by persons who will know what to do with you.”

     “Thank you, sir.”  The young soldier raised his hand to his forehead in salute, but the captain stopped him.

     “No, soldier—it is I who salute you.”  Grim faced, he touched his forehead with the tips of his fingers.  The private felt a flush creep over his face, and was relieved when the officer turned away, leaving him standing alone.

     A chill had settled in the soldier’s bones.  Civilian’s clothes—a disguise.

     Spies are hanged.

* * *

     That night—April 7, 1862—twenty-four men gathered in a clearing off the road leading towards Shelbyville, Tennessee.  None bore any mark of military rank or significance; all were dressed as civilians.  Nor did any one ventured to ask the purpose of this measure, or even whether his comrades were soldiers or civilians themselves.  They simply watched, and waited.

     And then suddenly there was a movement in the crowd.  A man stepped forward, his hat tilted ominously over his eyes and a coat wrapped about his thin body.  Instinctively the men drew back, giving him room.  His eyes, dimly visible in the darkness, darted around the circle.  At last he spoke.

     “Boys,” he said in a peculiar tenor voice, “we’re all here now.  I mean to be far away from this place by morning, so explanations will be quick and I expect you to listen at attention.”

     A rustle went around the circle as, out of habit, the men stood at attention.  Almost immediately there was a sort of relief on every face; they were, after all, soldiers and comrades.  Standing slightly behind the rest, a young soldier called Parrott narrowed his eyes in pensive silence.

     The man in the center of the circle smiled ever so slightly at this movement, but went on without change of voice.

     “My name is James Andrews,” he said, slowly, deliberately.  “I am your leader in this expedition.  We are going behind the Confederate lines—to Georgia, in fact.”

     The private took in a slow breath.  It was what he had feared—the worst of his fears.  They were going behind Rebel lines.  He had volunteered as a spy.

     The voice of the man went on, disregarding the awed murmurs rippling through the group.

     “In accordance with General Mitchel’s wishes, we are to burn the railroad bridges on the Western & Atlantic, cutting off the supply line to Chattanooga.  This will, of course, leave it vulnerable to attack and capture, which the general will see to once we have carried out our end of the bargain.” 

     The murmuring hushed as all eyes turned to their leader in utter amazement.  The young soldier’s mouth hung partially open.  The man beside him had clapped a hand to his forehead in shameless astonishment.  Across the circle, a blue-eyed soldier with a young face stood perfectly still, his eyes on the man called Andrews.

     “Well?” the man said at last.  He seemed almost pleased at their shock.  “This is our plan; if you have no questions, we will begin at once.

     “B-but sir—burning the bridges in Georgia—how do you mean to do it?”

     As one, every face turned to Andrews.

     “By the most practical means,” said Andrews coolly.  “We will travel to Marietta and ride north a ways as passengers.  At the Big Shanty breakfast stop we will steal the engine and run north with it, burning the bridges behind us.”

     The young soldier began to speak, but then shut his mouth, frowning.  Logically, the fellow’s plan was idiocy.  And yet, through pure idiocy, could it work?  It was brilliantly absurd—stealing an engine from beneath the Johnny’s noses and using it against them!  Suddenly lofty thoughts began to grow in his mind…an expedition of such greatness could not be carried out without some reward to those involved.  Promotion, perhaps—or to be decorated by Congress!

     A clap of thunder silenced such thoughts.  His eyes, staring broodingly at the ground, now searched out Andrew’s face in the darkness.  For several moments no one spoke. 

     “Well,” Andrews said at last, “I have said my part, and now I need to hear yours.  Boys, this is a dangerous mission.  We wear the clothes of civilians.  To the Johnnies, we are spies—no matter that it was not spying that brought us south.  Spies are hanged.”

     Spies are hanged.  The words stung like the bullet he had taken at Ivy Mountain, and the young soldier’s hand went unconsciously to his throat.  He had seen a hanging once—seen the trapdoor fall and the rope tighten; seen the man writhe as his life breath was slowly robbed from him.  The scene had both terrified and hardened him.

     “Now that you’ve heard that,” the man was saying, “I give you a choice: you may go back to your camp and go on as if nothing had happened, or you may come with me, and purpose to succeed or leave your bones in Dixie.”

     Lightning forked across the sky, silhouetting Andrew’s gaunt form against the light.  The young soldier looked around quickly, searching for a movement on the part of the men that would suggest any of the doubts he himself felt.  There was none.  Across from him, the blue-eyed stranger was smiling slightly.

     The thunder faded, and a silence came over the gathering.  The soldier could see Andrews’ face, and the strange gleam in his eye.

     “We’re off, then,” he said.  “Separate yourselves into small groups for the journey, just so that you are inconspicuous.  If you fall in with Rebels, give out that you are from Kentucky, escaping the rule of the abolitionists.  You have three days to reach Marietta.  And…” he looked around at each man in turn, “we will meet, if it please God, in Georgia.”

     As Andrews dismissed his followers, the rain began to fall.  Lightly first, drumming pleasantly on the ground, and then faster, so that Jacob Parrott retreated further beneath the cover of the trees.  Hunching his shoulders against the water dripping from the branches above, he watched in silence as the men separated themselves and disappeared, one after the other, into the darkness.

     It was the blue-eyed stranger who approached him at last.  They came face to face before either spoke—Jacob awkward and silent; the other relaxed and amiable.

     “Neither of us seem to be very popular,” the stranger noted, smiling through the rain, “so I thought it might do us both good to travel together.”

     Jacob wanted to smile at his dry humor, but he held it back and extended his hand, saying nothing and feeling foolish for it. 

     “Samuel Robertson,” the stranger introduced, shaking his hand firmly.  “Of the 33^rd Ohio, I would say if I were addressing General Mitchel…but I’d better learn to drop the end of it, eh?”

     Without any invitation the corners of Jacob’s mouth turned up in a smile, and almost at once he found his voice.

     “Jacob Parrott,” he said, loudly over the rain, “of the same regiment.”

     “Twice the camaraderie, then.”  Robertson looked over his shoulder, and, seeing that nearly the whole of the party had dispersed, turned again to Jacob.

Chapter One: The Gray

     There was nothing to distinguish him from the others.  He sat on an upturned wooden bucket, his legs spread apart and his elbows planted on his knees.  His boots, taken off a dead comrade some months since, were muddied; his uniform discolored.  His chin was resting in his hands, hiding his mouth, but in his eyes one could read his mind.

     Beside him crouched a fellow soldier, his knees doubled against his chest as he hunkered near the fire.  He reached out his hands and spread his fingers, hoping to absorb the heat.

     “They’ve drug in two spies, the men say,” he said after a moment, cutting an upward glance at the fellow on the bucket.  “They’ll be hanged soon.  Great sport to see a Yankee hang, wouldn’t you say, Lieutenant?”

     The soldier on the bucket arched his eyebrows in silent contemplation.

     “Some excitement, I should say,” he murmured at last, his voice muffled behind his hand.

     Opposite them, a third man raised his voice.

     “Hear tell the boys found ‘em snooping around the railroad bridge.  Came too close to our pickets…and now we’re havin’ ourselves a hanging.  A double hanging, no less!”

     The lieutenant rose slowly, folding his arms across his chest.

     “You boys get the most out of that fire,” he advised with a wry smile.  “I’ve got business.”

     The first soldier made him a friendly salute and quickly occupied the seat on the bucket.

     “You can count on it, Lieutenant!  You see about the Yanks, and we’ll keep this here fire company!”

     He smiled as he left them.  The boys were taking everything in stride.  He was lucky to have such a stouthearted company.  Eighty-seven men in all, and every one of them as good as they come.

     The rows of tents looked desolate this morning.  They were sinking in mud and wet through with the rain, so that most of the soldiers found the campfires a much more comfortable alternative.  The cheerful blazes lit a pathway through the camp, penetrating the fog that clung to the ground.

     The lieutenant sighed to himself as he walked among his men and those of his regiment.  They deserved better than this.  It was a disgrace for the lot of them to be stationed two hundred miles away from any action—a regiment as loyal to the cause as any that tread the battlefield.  Big Shanty, Georgia, was no place to prove one’s patriotism.

     “Coming to the boys’ entertainment, Lieutenant?”

     He stopped and looked up at the soldier who had called to him.

     “Happening now, is it?”  He glanced around, wondering whether it was seemly for the officers to be a part of such events.  “I’ll come,” he said after a moment.  Yes, he would like to see a Yankee hang.  Perhaps it would satisfy his longing for battle to watch these two die a shameful death, writhing at the end of a rope.

     Ahead of him he saw the gallows, hastily erected to serve their ghoulish purpose.  There were no trapdoors; only a wooden platform held up by several pieces of wood.  The supports had only to be knocked out from beneath the two victims.  For a moment he felt his throat constrict, a nameless dread creeping up his spine.  He tried to quell it, hating himself for such cowardliness.

     “Are they coming?” he inquired of a soldier who stood by.  The man flashed a toothless grin.

     “Aye, Lieutenant, sir.  They’ll not make us wait long!”

     He rested his shoulders against a tree trunk, shivering at the dampness of it.  It was a gloomy morning for the two spies, no doubt.     

     “Here they are,” came a gleeful shout. 

     The lieutenant saw the squad of soldiers coming towards them, bayonets at the ready, and craned his neck to see the prisoners in their midst.  Where were they?

     The soldiers parted to allow the condemned onto the platform.  They ascended slowly, their backs to the crowd: two ragged Yankees, dressed in civilian’s clothes—the clothes of a spy.

     Suddenly they turned to face the mob.

     The lieutenant’s stomach lurched, and his hand flew to his mouth.

     “They’re children!” he breathed. 

     The provost marshal came forward with a faltering step, adjusting the ropes around their necks.  The first was a youth no more than sixteen; the second as much as two years younger.  The lieutenant saw his pale face contort as the rope was placed over his head.  He began to cry suddenly, reaching out in desperation to the soldiers.  The older boy kicked him, and the lieutenant caught his words faintly:  “Show them how a Union man can die for his country!”

     The lieutenant looked down, unable to watch.  He could feel his heartbeat pounding in his ears, throbbing out a wild rhythm.  The faces of the soldiers around him betrayed their unabashed horror.  Was this to be a war on children and innocents?

     The young boy was whimpering pitifully, threatening to lose consciousness before the time came.  In a moment the supports would be knocked out, and two corpses would dangle in the air.

     The lieutenant turned away, walking—stumbling—blindly towards the camp.  He heard the platform fall—the shriek of the young boy—the murmur of the soldiers.  It was over.

     Doubling over, he lost his breakfast into the bushes.