Civil War Articles by Julian WilliamsStories Handed Down Tell of Exciting Jacksonville Times
Was Gunpowder Really Placed Under Blockhouse Church?
This article was compiled by Julian Williams.
I had so many positive and interesting comments on the stories of cousin Robert Jeffries last week; I thought it might be a good idea just to give the reader a couple more of those tales. Robert told me to be sure to say that these tales may or may not be for real. He emphasizes the fact that they were, unlike his own encounter with the ghost in the swing and her Confederate suitor, handed down by people from the past. When this happens, ofttimes the facts (or nonfacts) get embellished - added to. But I enjoyed those hand-me-downs from yesteryear and I think you will too.
The first story goes something like this: During Civil War times a slave owner had given the task of tending to the family's baby to a little slave girl. One Sunday morning, when everyone was getting ready to go to Blockhouse Church for worship service, the little girl began to cry and the family asked her to tell them why she was shedding tears. She said she was crying because she would never see the little baby again. Now the family was upset and wanted more information. The little girl replied that she could say no more because she would receive a whipping. They assured her she would not be punished so she finally told them a barrel of gunpowder was under the church and it would blow up when all the people gathered inside the church. A rider on horseback was sent out to warn all the people to stay out of the building. Two men went to the church and found the powder; they knew then the little girl was telling the truth. From then on, the little girl always lived with the family and she was never punished by anyone.
Obviously, slavery is now recognized as an unacceptable practice in this country. I would suspect that the number of people holding slaves was very small. The irony of slavery is the fact that, in a way, it enslaved the owners in a worse way than the slaves. The owners were enslaved by prejudice and lowering themselves to hold another human being in bondage. They were in a type of bondage much harder to extricate oneself from. People have to watch this same mindset today lest we become slaves to something undesirable in our lives.
The above story reminded me of one about Doc Holliday, the Georgia dentist who went West and turned into a regular Wild West personality. When he lived at Valdosta, he and some buddies put gunpowder barrels under the Lowndes County Courthouse to blow up some people they didn't care for! Doc's father, who at one time was Mayor of Valdosta, knew his boy had too much spare time on his hands and sent him to dental school in Pennsylvania! The rest is history.
The other story Robert told me was about one of the subjects of last week's article - Anna (Annie) Jane White Wells, his great grandmother. It seems that Annie was at her mother's house near China Hill when the family received word that enemy troops (Union soldiers) were on the way to their home. They were warned that General Sherman and his boys in blue were on their way south and to hide anything of value in the woods.
Annie and the others commenced taking their cows, pigs, silverware and anything else not tied down, out to the hiding place. Then, later in the day, they heard horses walking and men talking - coming down the road! The soldiers stopped at the gate and holloed (I think this is a nice word for 'hollered'), "Hello!"
Great grandmother Annie went to the door and the man asked if he and his troops might spend the night in the room where the fireplace was, as they were hungry, and told her they would cook their supper and breakfast in the fireplace and eat in that same room . Annie didn't really have too much of a choice since the family's menfolks were off fighting the war in land knows where!
So, Annie took the children and went to a back bedroom and slept (probably with one eye open!). The soldiers killed chickens and used flour to make bread. The next morning they had eaten their fill and told Annie they were leaving and thanked her for her Southern hospitality. She always thought it was General Sherman himself but probably anyone in a blue uniform, sporting a sword, shouting orders and riding a horse, looked liked General Sherman to those scared folks!
Thinking one of 'em looked like Sherman reminded me of a story of a general in my lifetime. When I was a little boy in the 1940's, a car pulled up to my father's service station in Jacksonville, Georgia, and my mother, working at the store that day, saw a military man emerge from the car. She pumped the gas (customers seldom pumped their own gas then) for him, was paid on the spot and he drove off. When Mother returned to the store, Mrs. Iris Bland Burch, a neighbor, was very excited! She said, "Mattie, that was General Eisenhower!" Mother conceded that it did look a lot like him. When Mother told me this story I laughed at first but then got to thinking. Might have been Ike - because he probably kept the road hot between golfing in Augusta and shooting birds in Thomasville. I heard it said that the ranking Republicans used to select the next President of the United States in poker games on those plantations near Thomasville!
Robert didn't tell me this next story but I heard it as a youngster. It was told that a man, very drunk, was trying to get home from Jacksonville one dark night and decided to cut across the cemetery at Blockhouse Church. A grave had been freshly dug but the services were not to be until the following day. He fell into the dark hole and tried and tried to get out but could not. So, he resigned himself to his fate and huddled up in one end of the grave to stay the night. Later that night, another citizen gone wrong, also inebriated from hitting the bottle too much, came along and decided he would use the cemetery shortcut also. He also fell into the hole (not knowing he had a companion in there with him at the other end). He tried and tried to climb out but failed. He was about to try one last time when a voice from the darkness of the grave said, "It's no use - I've been in here for some time and tried to get out and it's impossible."
Somehow, this statement suddenly made many things possible! It is said that man zoomed up out of that grave like a rocket and hastened home in record time, tearing up creek beds and pine trees getting there! It is said that he didn't go back to Jacksonville for another drink of whisky in a long, long time!
I certainly appreciate the help given me by Robert and his brother, Gene Jeffries. If you want to know where you came from these fellows can just about tell you. Robert now lives in La Grange, Georgia, and Gene is in Columbia, SC, but they have their roots in the rich river mud of Jacksonville, Georgia.
