My Wood Family

Memories of the Civil War Era in South Carolina

Emma Elizabeth Dowling Speaks was very young when the Civil War started.  She lived with her parents and siblings including brother William Hamilton Dowling in South Carolina in an area where Yankee General William T. Sherman marched through destroying much in his path. In the 1930s Emma wrote down some of her remembrances and they are presented below.  When transcribing these I attempted to keep the original flavor of her writings and have not corrected spelling or grammar except where absolutely necessary. Also, these documents are arranged by time the events took place and not when they she recorded them.  I encourage you to read them in order presented below.  A link to  her original handwritten copy is at the end of each document. 

Emma's brother William's daughter (Annie) Maud Dowling Turner also recorded some of what her father William Hamilton Dowling passed on to her.  Her story recorded in 1946 covers the period both before and after the Civil War. It is very interesting.  You can read it here. 

Hamilton and Emma were my great grandfather's brother and sister.

April 6^th 1937

Memories of Mrs. Emma Dowling Speaks

February 1865, 72 years ago

 General Shermans army marched from Atlanta through Georgia to Savannah, Ga and on to Columbia & marching from Savannah to Columbia the army passed through our home.  We were living then in St. Peters parish Beaufort County, but that county now, is Hampton County. 

Late one evening several men came to our home came in our yard & lot, caught our horses, out of our lot saddled them, caught our chickens & geese, & tied them by loads and threw them across the horses back & galloped away.  Others of them went to our hog pen killed out fat hogs out of the pen, dressed the meat & carried the meat I suppose to their camps.  They left the hogs heads & my little brothers dressed the heads & put them in a safe, & Shermans Soldiers I suppose they were dressed in blue came in & tok the heads & carried them away. They nocked our bee gums to pieces & took all the homey they wanted & turned the bee gums over & wasted what was left.  This was all done late one evening.

The next morning at sunrise Shermans army Said to be 17 thousand Soldiers began to pass in earnest. They were marching in a wide breast either side of the road and wagons in the road one right after the other loaded with cannons & provition & other things.  They took from people some of them came in our home, broke in our smoke hous, took all our nice smoked meat and evry thing they could find that was in there to eat & what they couldn’t use they destroyed. They just took possession of my father & mather’s hard earned property. mother steped to the back door said to shermans Soldiers please don’t take all our bacon. One of them Said a curse word to her, and went right on taking evry thing they could find to eat & distroying what they did’nt want to take with them. One called himself a captain he told we little children any thing we could get in our dwelling house, after evry thing ws gone except a little a little corn left in the barn & a few sheep left afther driving away, eigh fine cows & etc.  we caught 4 sheep got about, 2 fshels of corn and put in one of our rooms. But this isn’t as bad as some of our neighbours were treated not a knife fork or spoon was left them to eat with if They had had anything left to eat. 

Now 4 sheep and about 2 bushels of corn was all that shermans army left for a family of ten to live or die on. I was a young child 9 years of age but remember as well as if it had happened today.

A letter to the Editor. Fairfax S.C. Feburary 1932

Just a few memorys of the many rongs that General william T. Shurman & his Army did to South Carolina.

I was just a young child 9 years of age (Feb-1865) but remember as well as if it was today when a gang of men came to our home late in the evening. & took my Father’s horses & Saddled them caught our chickens & gees tied loads of them put them across the horses backs & glloped of with them.  Then others of them tore the tops of our bee gums off took what honey they wanted then turned the gums over to wast what was left, then killed our meet hogs out of the pen butchered them took the meet & carried it a way to their camp I Suppose.  This was late one evening then the next morning at sun rise the hole army begin to pass our home. Then they began to finish taking what was left from what had ben taken the eavening befor  They broke in Smoke house, Mother stept to the door of our house & said please don’t take all our meet they said a curse word * smtied the smoke house the kitchen cornhouse & evry thing they could find but before they got all the corn one called himself a captian he tole my little brothers if they would put some conr in our house he would not let the others bother it.  So the little children got about 3 bushels in our dweling house & that was evry moth full of food left for a family o feleven to eat.  Except about 1 or 2 lbs of bacon Shurm’s army did not happen to find but they took evry thing of any value they could find.  They burned Several tenant houses that on one was livng in. 

April 9 1937

Memories of Mrs Emma Dowling Speaks during & after the war between the States.

There is always a feast after a famine, people didn’t have such an easy time before Lee Surrendered to Grant April 9, 1865 at Appomattox court house. When the women & children had to Spin out of cotton the thread to make the cloth then, weave the cloth in home made looms. Weave about 30-yard bolt in a piece, weave about from 4, to eleven yards a day and start weaving about Sunrise or as soon as they could see how to tie the threads when they broke. but before starting to weave the cloth, the thread was to be put on spools made of large canes about 6 inch long & the thread, was put on them about 30 yds on each spool. These spools were put in a frame on little round sticks the spool standing straight up. One thread taken from each spools held, in hand, till all was gathered to gather, then worped of an what is called warping bars, worped off. Then all these threads attached to what is called a thread beam, on the back of the loom scattered along then, farther in front. There was something called harness made of thread hanging straight up & down with nots, called eyes That evry thread was put through. one would sit on one side & another on the other side, one would hand thread by thread and the one on the opposite side would draw the threads through with a hook until all was pulled through the harness.  Then through what was called a Sleigh made of reids out of cane & on to a breast beem. 2 treddles to work with feet which the harness & sleigh was so fixed that when one treadle was mashed it would open the thread & throw the shuttle through. there was something called a battern used by both hands with reid & sleigh which noched the threads to gather, then mash another treadle & it would open for another shuttle to go through evry time the shuttle passed through thread by thread was nocked to gather.  The shuttle had little quills filled with thread called filling & the thread that was put in the loom & through harness & sleigh was called warp. & so many other things to be done before the cloth was ready to sew with fingers, it is too numerous to try to explain.  That was apart of the way the homespun was made to make though home spun dresses the southern ladies wore.

The women had to nit all the stockings they wore and all the socks the men wore also all the children wore. It seemed to people to be laziness to go with out stocking so no one went with out as the women kept plenty nit for their families no matter how large the familie were. They made almost evry thing they wore and ate then except coffee & that they did’nt except a substitute for 4 years as there was’nt any thin used our side of the Confederate states & coffee did not grow in them. The people parched rye rice meal grist & etc. and grownd it in coffee mills and drank that in the place of coffee they boiled these substitutes like it was coffee in coffee pots. The boys too young to be in war & the elder man that was too old to be in war made all the shoes that was worn & all wore shoes after the war. Rev John Preacher, Mrs Mamie Wilson’s father made a neat a man or woman shoe as any one would like to look at. He is Mrs Robie Wilson Sander’s Grand father also her other sisters & brothers Grand father. The people grew wheat & growed & bolted the wheat in flour pretty & white. They also grew rice & beat the chaff of[f] in morters with wooden pessils & faned the chaff with home made fanners, the rice when finished was as white as it is now by machine.

The people during the war they also grew Sugar cane grounded the cane boiled the juice in large bailers to syrup & sugar. the sugar was brown. they grew corn potatoes, peas, peanuts & etc, raised hogs, cows, horses, mules, sheep, goats, turkeys, chickings, gees, ducks & so on. But evry body had to work to keep the wheels turning. The mathers worked day & part of night to keep their children in school all they possibly could. My eldest Sister Susan Dowling then, but married J. A. Tuten after the war. She taught part of each of the 4 years at of war. I was little over 5 years of age then but went to school with & to her as long as she taught. She taught Mr Ralph Lightsy’s grand mather, her 2 sisters & one brother They were misses Clem Rosa & Lizy Mathews & Dock Mathews. Clem married Mr Langford. Mr Lightsy’s mother was Langford. Now the soldiers mothers brothers &sisters & fathers that was too old to be in war did all this and more & when sherman’s army came & distroyed near all their labours that they could find & left starvation on the land & a lot what the poor soldiers work for before they went to war. This was the famine now comes the feast. The year 1865 was the most fruitful year I have ever known evry fruit tree vine and bush was loaded with good things to eat. Fruit trees did not blight & die then & almost every family had fruit trees, peaches, apples, plums, grapes, pombgranates, walnuts, hickory nuts, figs & etc. all these fruits were in abundance. It seemed evry thing that was planted just praspered & soon had water melons cantilops & all the vegatables that we wanted & to spare. We got hold of a few hens & raised lots of chickens. Evry body seemed to take evry thing to God in prayers & the greate feast was friendship with all the people. They were kind to each other friendly neighborly & evry body seemed to love each other. After a hard days work peopl would meet at each others houses & have prayer service and giving thanks to our good Lord & savior that things were no worse than they were.

In the fall of 1865, my eldest brother Rev W. H. Dowling & eldest sister Susan Dowling got up a shool of 52 puples, said to be a pay school but no one had any thing much to pay with but they taught with as much interest as if they were getting a great salary. I had 4 brothers & 4 sisters 9 of us & 6 out of nine were school teacher.

Rev J. F Preacher as before mentioned. He was’nt only a shoe maker but he was a minister of the Gospel, a good school teacher & a fine farmer & a mill right. This is just a sketch of many memories.

Fairfax S.C.

July 4^th 1935

Just a sketch of memory

History of Hopewell. Hopewell Baptist Church was builed in the yeare of 1856.  It was erected by the members, at that time. And the friends and good people of the Hopewell community. Namely Mr Washington Smith, Mr A. M. Ruth, Sr, Mr Washington Goethe Sr. Mr W. T Speaks, and many others of those christain people of Hopewell.  A wonderful church of grate ministers of the Gospal. Namely Rev J. T. Sweatt. Rev Henry Shuman Rev J. F. Preacher Rev George Kinard Rev Jonas Trawell Rev . J. J. Nix. Rev M. H. Shuman Rev J. T. Morrison Rev W H Dowling. These are some of the ministers of the earlier life of Hopewell church who have done a great work in helping save precious souls & conducting those glorious protracted meetings.  When so many loved ones joined the church and were Baptized in black creek waters and since those days many worthy ministers have done and are doing a greate work at Hopewell Rev J. W. Middleton and the members & friends of Hopewell are So faithful in doing Such a greate and wonderful work and still keeping up Dear old Hopewell church. Their Sunday School cant be excelled.  Through the paster members and friends earnest and faithful work

I’ll recall the names of Some of the members friends and visiters of Hopewell who have long ago passed on to reep their reward.  Namely The Youmans’ The parnells. The Goeths The Peeples, The Gills, The Smiths, The nixn, The Trowells, The Shumans, The Muligans, The Marees, The chislms, the Foresters, the DeLoachs, The Ruths, The Speaks, The Lavens, The Whitefords, The Googes, The Bowers, The Ginns, The Rentz, The Hiers, The Bishops, The Goodings, The craps, The Griners, The Pies [?], The Longs, The Browns, The Hoovers, The Reids, The Rosiers, Dr H.W.C. Folk & family, The Dowlings, The Tulens, the Weekley, the Allmans the Fritts, The Palls, The Mixsons, The Sharbes, The Carters, The Johnsons, The Hadwins & also Mr Kite Frolk & Mr Getsinger both singing school Professors who taught Singing School at Hopewell.

A church I love being a church my parents loved who sleep in the cemetery by its side I also love the grawn on which the church is builed which recall sweet memaries of meeting and greeting loved ones of long ago.

By the only surviving child of my parents J T & M A Dowling

Emma D. Speaks

Handwritten Copy

If you have any questions or comments; need assistance with any of these lines; or can help me identify an old photograph, please let me know.

Compiler: , Apopka Florida 32712