William Hyram Brinlee - Texas Home Guard
1892-1865
Tommy Lewis of Oklahoma sent me a copy of a letter written by his great, great grandfather William Hyram Brinlee requesting pension benefits due a Confederate veteran. This letter is interesting for what it says in the space between the words. As William points out, in the opening rush of any war the best and the brightest join up immediately and run off to fight. This leaves the countryside left behind full of young boys, old men and troublemakers. In the movie Cold Mountain the character Ruby comments that there “Aint no men left that aint old or full of mischief.” She was taking about North Carolina but it was even truer out in the Tran-Mississippi.
Jan. 15, 1921
Colonel R.E. Sneed, Commissioner of Pensions for state of Oklahoma
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Dear Comrade:
If you will ransack your memory, you will certainly remember me.
I am the same Bill Brinlee that helped to build a store house for you at Pauls Valley and traded with you two years afterwards, and finally sold you an Indian lease on rock creek at Elmore.
In regard to my pension, I understand that you have failed to find my name on the rolls at Washington and I will try to explain to you why.
I was very young when the war between the states broke out. My older brothers R.M. Brinlee, G.R. Brinlee, H.C. Brinlee, and D.F. Brinlee were volunteers and served throughout the war. After they and all other true and valiant young of our country had gone to the front. The bush whackers, thieves, and deserters was about to overrun the country and was making life and property insecure.
About this time something had to be done and there was at home on furlough a regularly commissioned captain of the Confederate government, Tom Scott by name, who organized the boys under age and some of the old men who were able into a company of home guards, and commissioned the old men, some of them to command this company, for the upholding of the Confederate government. Their names, that I recollect, was Charley Wysong and Tom Eckels. We were regularly enlisted as a home guard, subject to the orders of our captain, whoever might be in command, quelled threatened uprising of the Negroes, incursions by bands of thieves, and avenged wanton murders where they were committed. In fact, we, with all ardor of our young lives, upheld the honor of the Confederacy.
I went with my father to the Mouth of Mill Creek below Lanesport to take a wagon load of provisions to my brothers and the rest of the army, that was in 1864, and stayed with Gano's brigade as a regular enlisted soldier until we disbanded on account of the fall of the Confederacy.
Your Comrade,
W. H. Brinlee
William Brinlee grew up near Melissa, TX in Collin County. It was there that Captain Tom Scott enlisted him and others into the Home Guard. When the war broke out the Union stripped its western forts of men to fill the long neglected ranks in the east, and many of the young men saw their chance for adventure and left home, heading north and south to join the fight.
Both the North and the South had three classes of soldiers. For the North there was the regular army, mostly made up of carrier soldiers who had been serving when the war broke out and didn’t quit and join south. This was the smallest group. The largest group for the North was the state militias who joined for a specific length of time; it was the state militias who did most of the fighting. The last and lowest of the Union forces where the irregulars called the Jayhawkers, they were supposed to act as a state guard and maintain law and order.
For the South the bulk of the forces where the Confederate States Army, the CSA; these were men who had joined the army: while they served with their states they fought mostly as part of an army corps. Those who couldn’t serve with the army because of age or infirmity but wanted to do something joined the Home Guard. It was the function of the Home Guard to maintain law and order behind the lines, they also served to round up runaway slaves and army deserters. The last and again lowest group was the Bushwhackers, irregular forces in the Border States and territories.
The first thing to notice in William Branlee’s letter was that he was enlisted into the Home Guard to suppress “the bush whackers, thieves, and deserters” who were overrunning the countryside. The obvious question concerning any irregulars like the Bushwhackers are why, if they are so supportive of their respective side, didn’t they join the army and go fight? Or if they can’t do that then join the Home Guard like William did. The obvious answer is they didn’t want to submit to army discipline and bushwhacking was more fun. Its interesting William didn’t mention the Jayhawkers, which operated mainly out of Kansas but raided into surrounding states and Oklahoma. Home Guard was expected to fight Union forces operating in their territory, but it would appear that the bushwhackers were the bigger or at least more memorable problem.
Another point of interest was his comment concerning suppression of a slave uprising. The biggest fear of the southern aristocracy had always been an armed slave revolt. When people speak of slavery in America usually they refer to Virginia or the Deep South, but slavery was practiced in Texas, the Oklahoma Indian Territory and all the way out on the West Coast as well. Some Indian Tribes owned slaves, that’s why there were Indian regiments fighting for the Confederacy.
In 1842 there was a slave revolt in the Oklahoma Territory in the Cherokee Nation. The escaped slaves headed south toward Mexico and were joined by slaves from the Creek Nation. The escapees got as far as three hundred miles south west of Fort Gibson before they were recaptured. Embedded in Williams remarks are that there must have been another uprising between 1861 and 1864. I have not been able to find any reference to a slave revolt around that time in Texas or Oklahoma. William’s comments make it sound as if the revolt was crushed early before it could get rolling but he wouldn’t have mentioned it as a proof of service unless it was well known and involved action: Read violence. If anyone knows something more about this I would be very interested in hearing about it.
Note: There were rumors of a slave revolt in Texas in 1860 involving some mysterious fires but there never was an real evidence to support that any slaves set the fires and the date is to early for William to have been involved, anyway.
When William got older he joined the CSA and served under Gen. Gano, Tommy wrote that he fought at the second battle of Cabin Creek; he also wrote that William did get his pension after all confirming his service.