Larry Stephenson
Carroll County, MS
Zone 8
June, 1865
SOMEWHERE IN ALABAMA…a threadbare figure trudges down a dusty country road. He’s gaunt, unshaven, unwashed, shoulders slumping a bit, rather a despondent sort of character. He is Captain Davis, discharged from the Army of the Confederacy six weeks ago at Greensboro, NC, after serving his country faithfully for the past four years. He’s a civilian now and walking back to his home in Kosciusko, Mississippi. It’ll take him most of the summer. He’s eager to get back home, but at the same time, anxious as to what he is returning to – mail has been unreliable in the Confederacy of late; the last letter he had from his wife was eight months ago. These are uncertain times, and he doesn’t know if he will find his family and neighbors alive, or where they may be. He is fairly sure how he will find his farm – after four years without its master’s hand, the fields will be overgrown, stock run off, house and fences in poor condition, IF still standing.
He’s just spent the last four years of his life engaged in a War, and got whipped, and THOROUGHLY whipped, and he knows it; all that he has fought for has been lost. It shows in his attitude and his stance; it’s difficult not to be dejected. The last couple of years have been Hard Times in the South, and there’s the strong possibility times will become even harder.
He doesn’t have much. The patched gray uniform he’s wearing, cracked boots with one sole starting to flop, a Leech and Rigdon revolver with one nipple broken, a pocketknife, a blanket folded to make a pack containing a skillet made of a canteen half nailed to a stick, a small sewing kit, half a Bible (he’s been through desperate times recently, desperate indeed to force him to tear pages from his beloved Pocket Testament), and in one jacket pocket, a piece of cloth carefully wrapped around a dozen apple seeds. He takes out these seeds occasionally and gazes at them, then returns them to his pocket.
A couple of weeks ago, somewhere in the Carolinas, some kind soul took pity on him and gave him three apples. He ate them right away, stems, cores, and all, first food he had had in three days, and thought they were the very finest apples he had ever eaten. The seeds, though, he thoughtfully saved the seeds…
A few years ago he would have had no regard whatsoever for a palmful of apple seeds – just trash, something to be spat upon the ground after enjoying the fruit. Things are different now. To Captain Davis, those few apple seeds represent something…they are Something of Value; they represent HOPE, a promise of better things to come, a possibility of someday feeding his family…in his mind, they are his most valuable possession. Hope, and Promise, and Possibility – those things are short on the ground nowadays, and he seizes these things to his breast, desperately. He envisions his children wandering amongst the vast forest of apple trees he will plant from these seeds, plucking unblemished apples from fruit-laden boughs as pink and white petals flutter down around them, while the most delicious aroma in the world fills the air…hogs and horses fatten on the drops. This is a dream worth holding onto. Those apple seeds are his Treasure, and he guards them carefully.
In time, he does make it home. Some things are better than he expected, some worse. His wife is still alive; one child has died of a fever. His parents have passed away, but his wife’s parents are still alive. The house has burned down, but the barn is in good condition. The fields are overgrown with blackberries and sweetgum sprouts, but he knows they can be burned off in the coming winter, and the ashes will enrich the soil. He plants those apple seeds his second day home, in a prime spot, and tends them carefully. Most do sprout, and in time, produce fruit. All but one tree makes hard, sour crabapples, which he makes into cider. The one tree, though, makes very nice eating apples, pretty color, and good flavor. He digs sprouts to plant several more around his property, and does feed his family with them, and after a number of years even has enough to sell for cash. His neighbors all want trees of this apple, and he generously shares them.
When Captain Davis is an old, old man, his grandsons build him a bench under the original tree. He sits there often, when the weather is nice, and reflects upon his life. Occasionally he looks up at the limbs, and muses to himself, “Ah, well, at least I got ONE good thing out of that damn war!”
OK, this story is 99% pure speculation and imagination on my part, but the basic facts are there. Don’t you think this is likely the way it happened? I’m a Southerner myself
Carroll County, MS
Zone 8
June, 1865
SOMEWHERE IN ALABAMA…a threadbare figure trudges down a dusty country road. He’s gaunt, unshaven, unwashed, shoulders slumping a bit, rather a despondent sort of character. He is Captain Davis, discharged from the Army of the Confederacy six weeks ago at Greensboro, NC, after serving his country faithfully for the past four years. He’s a civilian now and walking back to his home in Kosciusko, Mississippi. It’ll take him most of the summer. He’s eager to get back home, but at the same time, anxious as to what he is returning to – mail has been unreliable in the Confederacy of late; the last letter he had from his wife was eight months ago. These are uncertain times, and he doesn’t know if he will find his family and neighbors alive, or where they may be. He is fairly sure how he will find his farm – after four years without its master’s hand, the fields will be overgrown, stock run off, house and fences in poor condition, IF still standing.
He’s just spent the last four years of his life engaged in a War, and got whipped, and THOROUGHLY whipped, and he knows it; all that he has fought for has been lost. It shows in his attitude and his stance; it’s difficult not to be dejected. The last couple of years have been Hard Times in the South, and there’s the strong possibility times will become even harder.
He doesn’t have much. The patched gray uniform he’s wearing, cracked boots with one sole starting to flop, a Leech and Rigdon revolver with one nipple broken, a pocketknife, a blanket folded to make a pack containing a skillet made of a canteen half nailed to a stick, a small sewing kit, half a Bible (he’s been through desperate times recently, desperate indeed to force him to tear pages from his beloved Pocket Testament), and in one jacket pocket, a piece of cloth carefully wrapped around a dozen apple seeds. He takes out these seeds occasionally and gazes at them, then returns them to his pocket.
A couple of weeks ago, somewhere in the Carolinas, some kind soul took pity on him and gave him three apples. He ate them right away, stems, cores, and all, first food he had had in three days, and thought they were the very finest apples he had ever eaten. The seeds, though, he thoughtfully saved the seeds…
A few years ago he would have had no regard whatsoever for a palmful of apple seeds – just trash, something to be spat upon the ground after enjoying the fruit. Things are different now. To Captain Davis, those few apple seeds represent something…they are Something of Value; they represent HOPE, a promise of better things to come, a possibility of someday feeding his family…in his mind, they are his most valuable possession. Hope, and Promise, and Possibility – those things are short on the ground nowadays, and he seizes these things to his breast, desperately. He envisions his children wandering amongst the vast forest of apple trees he will plant from these seeds, plucking unblemished apples from fruit-laden boughs as pink and white petals flutter down around them, while the most delicious aroma in the world fills the air…hogs and horses fatten on the drops. This is a dream worth holding onto. Those apple seeds are his Treasure, and he guards them carefully.
In time, he does make it home. Some things are better than he expected, some worse. His wife is still alive; one child has died of a fever. His parents have passed away, but his wife’s parents are still alive. The house has burned down, but the barn is in good condition. The fields are overgrown with blackberries and sweetgum sprouts, but he knows they can be burned off in the coming winter, and the ashes will enrich the soil. He plants those apple seeds his second day home, in a prime spot, and tends them carefully. Most do sprout, and in time, produce fruit. All but one tree makes hard, sour crabapples, which he makes into cider. The one tree, though, makes very nice eating apples, pretty color, and good flavor. He digs sprouts to plant several more around his property, and does feed his family with them, and after a number of years even has enough to sell for cash. His neighbors all want trees of this apple, and he generously shares them.
When Captain Davis is an old, old man, his grandsons build him a bench under the original tree. He sits there often, when the weather is nice, and reflects upon his life. Occasionally he looks up at the limbs, and muses to himself, “Ah, well, at least I got ONE good thing out of that damn war!”
OK, this story is 99% pure speculation and imagination on my part, but the basic facts are there. Don’t you think this is likely the way it happened? I’m a Southerner myself