Diary of Ephraim Shelby Dodd; 1862-1864: Terry's Texas Rangers; Company D; 8th Texas Cavalry Regiment: Civil War Texas Ranger & Cavalry, #1

By Ephraim S. Dodd

"Diary of Ephraim Shelby Dodd; 1862-1864: Terry's Rangers; Company D; The 8th Texas Cavalry Regiment" by Ephraim Shelby Dodd is the diary of a member of Company D of the storied 8th Texas cavalry regiment also known as Terry's Rangers.

Ephraim Dodd was a member of Company D of this famous cavalry unit so this diary records his day-to-day experiences during the Civil War from his frontline prospective in that company. Dodd was captured and hung as a spy by Union forces in early January 1864, ostensibly because he was wearing blue uniform pants and had this diary in his possession. That was the good reason for hanging him as a spy. The real reason was apparently because Generals Sherman and Grant had issued orders that captured confederates wearing Union uniforms and/or carrying papers with Union troop movements were to be dealt with severely.

Can't get much "severer" than hanging, can you? At any rate, even Union army officers and at least one Northern newspaper, at that time, condemned Dodd's execution, on such flimsy grounds.

Terry's Texas Rangers were one of the most famous Texas cavalry units in the Civil war. From a full strength of 1,200 at the start of the war, they could muster only about 200 in their last charge at the battle of Bentonville, North Carolina in 1865.

In the original, this short book of approximately 11,000+ words is very costly since it was printed in small numbers in Austin, Texas in 1914, by the Texas State Library as a contribution to the history of Texas units during the Civil War. Meant only for interested students of the war and for research by historians it was not widely circulated. A companion volume, also very rare in its original form, to this book is "Terry's Texas Rangers" by Leonidas B. Giles, also available in e-book format. Giles' book in fact mentions the incident of Dodd's hanging as "one of the saddest events in all our career."

A great bit of the storied Civil war cavalry history of Texas military by an eyewitness of that tremendous struggle
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There are approximately 11,000+ words and approximately 37 pages at 300 words per page in this e-book.

NOTE: This book has been scanned then OCR (Optical Character Recognition) has been applied to turn the scanned page images back into editable text. Then every effort has been made to correct typos, spelling, and to eliminate stray marks picked up by the OCR program. The original and/or extra period images, if any, were then placed in the appropriate place and, finally, the file was formatted for the e-book criteria of the site. This means that the text CAN be re-sized, searches performed, & bookmarks added, unlike some other e-books that are only scanned---errors, stray marks, and all.

We have added an Interactive Table of Contents & an Interactive List of Illustrations if any were present in the original. This means that the reader can click on the links in the Table of Contents or the List of Illustrations & be instantly transported to that chapter or illustration.

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• Language: English
• Publisher: Maine Book Barn Publishing
• Release date: Jul 29, 2013
• ISBN: 9781497791558

Book preview

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

In his history of Terry's Texas Rangers, Mr. Leonidas B. Giles narrates the following tragic incident of the East Tennessee campaign:

It was during this winter that one of the saddest events in all our career happened: the hanging of E. S. Dodd by the enemy. He was a member of Company D. He was of a good family and well educated. For many years he kept a diary, setting down at night the happenings of the day. He was taken prisoner with this diary in his pocket. On that evidence alone he was condemned and executed as a spy.

In January 1914, the State Librarian received a letter from a resident of New York State, informing him that she had in her possession a diary found on the body of a Texas Ranger hung as a spy. Negotiations for its acquisition by the State Library were opened at once, and terminated successfully. The only information about the diary this person could give was that it was found by a lieutenant from a N. H. regiment, who for 3 years was a friend of our family, and some time before his death (which occurred six years ago) he gave it to me.

E. S. Dodd came to Texas from Kentucky late in 1860 or early in 1861. After visiting an uncle, James L. L. McCall, at Waco, he made his home with another uncle. Dr. John R. McCall, at Austin. He was teaching school near Austin, and was not yet out of his teens, when he enlisted in Terry's Rangers.

Ernest William Winkler

Texas State Library November 5, 1914

DIARY OF EPHRAIM SHELBY DODD

Transferred from old Diary.

Thursday, December 4th, 1862——I went out from M——to Mr.——, five miles from town. I went from there to General Morgan's Headquarters, leaving the Knox County filly at Mr.——and riding Walker's horse. I took supper at Lewis Black's, Morgan's Headquarters. The General was in town but came in .just after supper. I went on to Chenault's camp and staid all night with John and Van Benton.

Friday, 5th——Snowed all day. I rode to Alexandria and went out to Mr. Bass', seven miles, got there about night. I found all well.

Saturday, 6th——I remained quiet to-day. Miss Frances came over. I staid all night and Sunday, 7th, I started on my return to camp. Came to Statesville, got pair of boots, $25. Came out three or four miles and staid all night.

Monday, 8th——I got some cloth and came to town (M); stopped but a .short time. I saw Miss Kate, received a nice present, a sack to carry tobacco, made of red, white and blue. I came out to Mr. House's and staid all night.

Tuesday, 9th——Came back to camp. Company on picket. Burke in command at camp. I was put on comm. guard.

Wednesday, 10th——Lieutenant Ellis went on a scout. I went with him. Ten men detail went down on Wilson pike, turned off to left and staid all night with Mr. Smith, a clever man, nice family, daughters, etc.

Thursday, 11th——Crossed the railroad and went down near Franklin. Got a guide and went down