D. Archie Ridout, memoir
in reference to 1862; September 14, 1862
"[Chapter V, pages 44-50]
ITINERANT LIFE CONTINUED ---HARD TIMES---BATTLE OF SOUTH MOUNTAIN
The Baltimore Conference met April,1862, in Israel Church, Washington, D.C. This was
an important and interesting Conference. The reports of the brethren showed that they had
encountered many hardships during the year.
When the appointments were made, Daniel A. Ridout was sent to the Frederick and
Washington County Circuit. This was that long, hard, mountainous circuit that he had traveled in
’58 and ’59.
He went from that Conference feeling, despondent, but without a murmur. He made up
his mind to do the best he could, by the help of the Lord. The year 1862 was the hardest and
most dangerous of any year of his ministerial life.
His family lived not far from Burkettsville, Frederick county, at the base of South
Mountain. It was a picturesque but lonely spot. Everything passed off very well during the
summer. The war, of course, had assumed a general plan; the Confederates were successful in
nearly every battle. Barnes, in his incomparable History of the United States, says, “Washington
City had not been in such peril since the war began.”
The first of the Fall of this year, 1862, General Lee, “flushed with success, crossed the
Potomac and entered Maryland, hoping to secure volunteers and incite an insurrection.”
One morning we were awakened by shouts, and the rumbling of wheels. Arising, we
found that the Confederates were all around us; they were pitching their tents and planting their
artillery a few hundred yards from our house, and were making themselves generally
comfortable. Things looked gloomy, I assure you; father was not home, and we did not know
when he could get home, as the “rebel” pickets were scattered all over the mountain. They
remained there for a week or more, during which time they were frequent visitors at our house.
Mother, who was a courageous Christian woman, showed no signs of fear when they came, and,
woman-like, would have her say.
A private came in one day, and made an insulting remark, whereupon she grabbed him by
the nape of his neck and the seat of his gray breeches, and “fired him out” of the house. She then
put on her bonnet and went directly to the Confederate camp and reported him. The officers
made him come and apologize. At night, after committing us to the care of our heavenly Father, a
duty which she never forgot, she would put us to bed and sit up all night with an ivory-handled
dirk knife in her bosom.
We were all very much worried about father, and he was worried about us. He tried, three
times, to get home, but he was turned back each time by the “rebel” pickets.
His prolonged absence became unbearable, and mother had concluded to send us to a
neighbor’s and go in search of him. But on the morning of the 13th of September, he arrived
home; that was the day before the battle. He said, “I had a hard time to get here; I passed all the
guards safely until nearly home, when a sentinel leveled his musket at me, telling me at the same
time to “halt.” After answering all his questions, he said, sneeringly, “Darkey preacher, eh?, well,
pass on.”
We were all highly elated over the return of father. I came very near exploding; I showed
him the amount of money I had made by dipping water from the spring in the end of our garden,
with a little wooden pail, for the “rebs” to drink. They always paid me Confederate money, of
course.
The next day after father’s return, was a day long to be remembered, and a memorable
one in the history of our family. It was the day of the battle of South Mountain, September 14th
.
We were all up at day-break, no one had appetite for breakfast, except myself.
After the table had been cleared off, and were sitting gazing out the windows, a rebel
soldier called. He was a young man, and made himself very agreeable. I will give his
conversation with my mother as well as I can recollect it. Said he: “Auntie, we expect a fight
here to-day; the yankees are coming, and we are going to make it hot as h---- for them.” Said
mother: “Yes, and you had better take care of your own precious hide.” Then he began to dance
and sing:
“I wish I was in dixie, look away, look away.
I’ll live and die in dixie, look away.”
Said mother: “Take care, young man, that you don’t die in Maryland.” How truly prophetic were
the words of my mother, for he was the first dead man we saw after the battle, not over two
hundred yards from our house. But as an eye-witness, let me describe that battle. The rebels held
the vantage-ground, for they were in position with artillery planted and men in line, waiting for
the yankees. From where their first artillery was planted to our gate was not more than two
hundred and fifty yards. It is now about noon; the yankees, I see them coming, bayonets
glistening in the autumnal sun. They are nearing the rebel line, coming within range of their
larger guns.
They cross Mr. Whipp’s field of recently planted wheat; they are now behind the stone
fence. As they scale it, the command is given to the rebels to “fire.” It seemed as if heaven and
earth had collided.
The battle now begins in earnest; and nothing is heard but the incessant pop, pop, of the
musket, and the boom of the cannon. The yells and shouts of the men are as deafening as the
reports of their weapons. The yankees charge, but the rebel line stand firm. Balls fly in all
directions, one enters our house and imbed itself in the wall; for safety we repair to the cellar.
The firing subsides, father and sister go out in the yard to “reconnoitre.”
A rebel cavalier passing by sees them; maddened by the fact that the battle is almost lost
to them, he aims a pistol at father, pulls the trigger, but the weapon misses fire. Three times he
aims and pulls the trigger, each time it only snaps and refuses to kill “God’s anointed.” With an
oath he rides on.
Again the firing begins and the fight “waxes warm.” The pop, pop, pop of the muskets,
inter-mingled with the sullen boom, boom of the cannon.
Ah, but look, the cavalry are now engaged, we see them directly in front of our cellar
window. Look at those splendid chargers on which the Union cavalry ride. See their distended
nostrils; they smell the battle, they paw, they snort, their very “necks seem clothed with thunder.”
The Confederate cavalry gives way before the fearful charge.
For six consecutive hours the battle rages; the rebel infantry have yielded only a little.
The command is given to the Union soldiers to “advance, double-quick and sweep the field with
the bayonet.” This is too much for the “Johnnies;” they run like sheep over the mountain, leaving
their dead and wounded behind. The Unions have gained the victory, but it is a dear one.
Hundreds of the “boys in blue” lie dead and dying.
It is now dark; we come up out of our uncomfortable quarters and breathe more freely.
None of the family slept that night, except the writer, who was too young to realize the danger
through which we had just passed, and who thought the whole thing was simply “immense.”
Next morning, September 15th, old Sol arose in all his splendor. Father took us out on the
battle field, the sights of which are now vividly portrayed in my mind, although at the time I was
only five years old.
The dead and dying lay, as “thick as leaves,” upon the ground. Union and rebel, side by
side, in the embrace of death. The features of some were pleasant; of others, intense agony was
depicted on every lineament of their countenances. A leg here, an arm there; a head here, a foot
yonder. Horrible! horrible!
The young man whom I have alluded to, was lying on the side of the public road, with a
hole in his head, into which you could put your fist. “That is he,” said father. “Yes,” said mother,
“he died in Maryland.” It took several days to bury the dead.
On the 17th of September the great battle of Antietam was fought. We visited that
battlefield also but I cannot give a description of it. It was one of the bloodiest battles of the civil
war. The Federal soldiers were around about there for quite awhile. The home church was taken
for a hospital, and there were no religious services held in it for some time.
Father “weathered it out” until Conference, which met April 1863 in Baltimore, Md.,
Bishop Payne presiding. His report to this Conference was, necessarily, a poor one. At the rise
of the Conference he was sent to the Ellicott’s Mills Circuit."
Author
Name: D. Archie Ridout
Unit: N/A
Document Information
Type: Memoir
Subject(s):
- African American
Event Location: Burkittsville, Frederick Co., MD, South Mountain, MD
Document Origin: N/A
Source
D. Archie Ridout, The life of Rev. Daniel A. Ridout, late member of the Baltimore Annual Conference, of the African Methodist Episcopal Church (Wilmington, DE: J. Miller Thomas, 1891), HathiTrust.org
Transcripts
document-181.pdf 
