wallace colley. using journal entries and letters mr. shaffer discusses the experiences in key battles such as the severe wounding in 1863 and the amputation of his left foot a year later. the civil war round table hosted this event. >> thank you, again, for the invitation to speak here in the old dominion home. and i want to take just a couple of seconds to thank two specific groups. i was a lone story short. i was invited to speak at a church in washington county inn july 2016. the church was celebrating their 150th anniversary, and they invited me to come up and talk about what it might have been like trying to start a church in the immediate aftermath of the

american civil war. so my wife and i drove up and we walked into the back of the sanctuary. and we got there early. and there was one lady sitting in the sanctuary, and she jumps up, runs to the back, shakes my hand and says my family and i have something we think you may have an interest in, would you come out to my car after the program? i said sure and i go out to my car after we finish, she opens the trunk and tells me to hold my arms out. and she's in and out of the trunk and the stack is growing taller and taller. and i say to her what we have here, and she says these are my great grandfather thomas wallace colley's seven volumes hand written journals of his service in the first virginia cavalry and his post-war life. and i thought i was going to

fall over in the parking lot because as a historian you dream about things like that. so i want to thank all of the colley family. they are the most wonderful people i've ever had the pleasure to work with. and i'd be remiss if i did not thank the university of tennessee press who published the book. and so the family is happy. the publisher is happy, so i'm happy. so a little bit about this man now you've heard how this journey began. this obviously is the cover of the book of tom at a much later later in life. and as you can see he's pictured with a couple of crutches. i will briefly talk about why he was missing a left foot. and he became quite a popular man in southwest virginia, was photographed a great deal. i'll show you a few of the

photographs. i got the photo from his grandson who's still living. he's in florida. he's 95 years old. he does e-mail better than i do. and he has shared so many of the photos, and in the interest of time we can't see them all. but i'll close with my very favorite photograph, and that's also the only time i will read anything is at the end. so this is tom much later in life. we'll come back to the story of the foot in just a little bit. this is the earliest photograph that we have of tom. it was taken on his wedding day. he was married on christmas day 1872. i'll show you another photograph shortly of he and his young bride and the lady that probably saved his life. and i will elaborate on that as we go through. tom was born in 1837 about 2

miles outside of abingden. and he went into abingdon while the delegates were still in rich mbd in the succession convention contemplating whether or not they were going to take virginia out of the union. well, there was an old army officer, william jones commonly referred to known as grumble jones. some of you have probably known that name. he was a general in the confederate academy. he got along great with everybody in the confederate war effort except one person, and unfortunately that person was his boss, jeb stuart. but he got along with everybody else. so jones having graduated west

point, been in the old armier stationed out on the frontier while virginia is debating whether or not she's gog to leave the union, i guess jones could see the war clouds forming on the horizon so he went into abingdon and trying to start enlist young men to learn the art of war, if you will. and tom colley was one of those 100 or so young men that wanted to participate in this new they all thought at that point in time an adventure. there'd probably be one great battle. there'd be a winner. there'd be a loser, everyone would go home and everything would all end. i could spend hours talking about the people that went through the first virginia academy. it almost reads like an all-star list certainly of the confederate cavalry service. first colonel was jeb stewart, jones, bitsy lee, john singleton

mosby. the list goes on and on. mosby was there training in abingdon with tom colley. he and tom served together for almost the first year of the war. and tom stewart figured out this mosby many different missions with the first virginia cavalry. this is the earliest no photograph that we have of tom. the granddaughter, then the grand son i started doing some more research at virginia tech,

i discovered that they had over 50 letters that tom wrote during the war on the battlefield. starting with very first letter number one in the archives was a letter that he wrote to his family after he thought the bull run in 1861. so all of those letters are in the book. but in one of the letters, he wrote off to his mother, he had several sisters, his father, his brother who was also in the confederate cavalry but he was in a different regiment. he was up here in northern virginia, so he typically would see his brother on occasion. not too many letters to his brother, but a lot to his mother, sisters and father. he mentioned in a letter to his mother that he recently got into richmond and had his likeness taken. that's how they would say in those days he had gone to the studio to have a portrait

taken. we know the letter made it back home. that's how it ended up at virginia take. another family member had the letters, and they had it in their will when they passed away, they donated the letters to the archives in blocks bergh. whatever happened to that photograph? no one, including his grandson who has all of this grand pause photos doesn't have that one, so i keep hoping it'll pop up one of these days. this is grumble joes that i've already spoke about and of course john singleton most be on the right to be w. blackford later became a, lot of fabulous book, warriors with jeb stewart block burns and jones once a did his training decided to leave the union jones and a

battle hundred of these young troopers wrote to richmond and eventually they received orders to receive colonel jabs tour they were mustard in to the confederate service as the first virginia cavalry. from the washington rifles that was the name jones had given the company -- a lot of groups i added the slide not too long ago. many groups especially out west. often i will get a question what's battle where they in and i was always very careful, i certainly don't want to appear ruden answer but basically the first virginia cavalry was in virtually all of the battles here in the eastern theater. however tom kollie wasn't and all of these battles.

is see in the screen we already talked about first but nasa's there's one glaring omission that i'll get to in just a minute it's quickly going through he participated in this campaign when major general clan had four troops of monroe planned to traverse at the peninsula and sort of come into the back door of richmond so to speak. tom was there with jeb stewart and the cavalry recliner since. first of three wounds and least of the three the tom received was at waterloo bridge, two days before the second battle of manassas when a spent many ball spent meaning it had already traveled a great distance. i guess it'd run out of steam tom was wounded and he saw the ball strike to third and

ricochet and hit the insole of his right boot he didn't miss any service time but as a road at a very sore and booze foot for several weeks, and it was quite painful to mount this horse that was mild compared to the injuries that he would receive later he participated in the seven days campaign famously known after general johnson was very seriously wounded in the bill of seven finds or fair oaks. of 1862 and i'm sure that everyone has heard this name took command, robert e. lee. formally named the army of northern virginia. tom almost missed the battle of and teen or sharks bergh. if you were in the confederate calorie, you had to provide your own horse. when he left washington county he, left writing one of his

fathers horses. not a rich family, but they did have some hand land, and his father had a few horses. the army in northern virginia was already north of the potomac river on maryland soil and tom soares became ill. it wasn't shot or anything. if he knew what was wrong with the horse, he didn't write about it, he probably didn't know, he wasn't a veteran veterinarian. well, the army of northern virginia is not gonna wait on time to find a horse, so they continued to march northward and tom scurrying around, has never been to marilyn in his life, doesn't know anyone, and after several hours, he said and you can use your own imagination on filling in this potential clue, he secured a horse. he had no idea where the army of northern virginia was. they were as most of you know

not planning a fight along the banks of antietam creek. tom goes riding north, and as we get closer to sharps bergh in the far distance he can hear the sound of the guns. he continues writing and by the time he arrived in antietam, the battle had been raging for hours. he can't find any of the cavalry. during the battle, certainly a horrendous battle with still the most costly day in our nation's history in terms of casualties, september 17th, 1862 in antietam, in the middle of the battle like that, you can't say excuse, me has anyone seen the cavalry or can you point me in the direction of jeb stewart and his boys? you can't do that. tom is there they are fighting he doesn't want to miss it, he is just secured a new course, so he takes it to the rear,

ties it to a tree, you don't want your horse to get shot, and he gets in the trenches and fights at the rest of the battle with the second south carolina infantry. i just think -- he writes a great deal about that. i was a unique experience for him and it was important for him to find a horse, because if you were in the confederate cavalry and you lost your horse, you would better find another one quickly or you are going into the infantry. nothing wrong with boots on the ground at all, but by that point in the war, troopers had grown very fond of life in the saddle, especially with jeb stewart, so they did not want to transfer from the cavalry to the infantry. kelly's ford -- i'll come back to that in just a minute. st. patrick's day 1863, when

tom was left on the field for dead. that's why you do not see gettysburg on this slide. west virginia cavalry was definitely in getters bergh, they just made it and participated in day three, when general lee sent jets toward around trying to tack -- about the same time that the pedigree tremble charge was heading in from the front. tom was still lying in a hospital bed enrichment and every surgeon who looked at him said some, you are not going to make it. so that's why he was not at gettysburg. after convalescing for a little over a year, and in the interim, once surgeons enrichment believed he had gained enough strength, they thought probably the best thing to get aid in the healing process would be to let him board a train and travel back home to washington county, and nothing like a

mother's love that can help in the healing process. so tom is lying there in the home he was born in, upstairs, second floor in the bedroom he slept in every night since he was a wee little baby, and he hears horses on his mom and dad's front lawn. before he can even get out of bad someone yells out collie canoe ride? and he goes to the window and he recognized the voice and he goes to the window, and it's grumble jones. jones had just recently been appointed to head up the newly-created confederate military district southwest virginia and upper east tennessee. and major general emeralds burn sides forces had captured knoxville weeks prior, and they were advancing up through eastern tennessee, probably headed towards southwest

virginia specifically saltville, which by that point of the war was the only remaining supply of salt for the entire confederacy. all of the states of the confederacy least well space and saw mines. so jones was going south to try to block burn sides troops advance, and he knew tom, he had trained him, early in 1861, tom told jones, well, i don't have a uniform. i don't have a uniform yet. john said, it doesn't matter, do you have a horse? kollie said, sure i can borrow one from my dad. he said come on, i need you. so kollie goes with jones to saltville and, here you have a man dressed as a civilian and a brigadier general is giving him

directions and orders and kollie is deploying infantry, artillery and cavalry during the battle. and everybody in blood ville has never seen this guy before, most of them had never seen jones before. he's new in command of the new district. so they assumed this guy knows what he's doing, so they were calling collie everything from colonel to major to captain and he loved. he was a private. but he did his job very very well and then eventually the confederate war department thought that he gained enough strength that there was something surely they could find him for him to do, so the broader not too far away from where we are in gordon's fell, and he worked in the horse depot there for a few months, tending sick and wounded horses to get them healthy to rejoin

or be sent back to the army of northern virginia. tom went before the surgical review board on numerous occasions and he finally got a clean bill of health. the only thing that was on his mind was, where is the first virginia cavalry? someone in gordon ville total last we heard, they were somewhere out on the peninsula. so tom goes riding off by himself, it took him about three days to find them and a rejoin. he always called all the trumps troops he serve with his comrades. i think you mentioned that when you are working and speaking earlier about comrades and it was a very happy moment that quickly turned signed because after he had hugged and saw his old friends that he had seen little over a year, they informed him that jab stewart had passed away a couple of

days before from the mortal wound he received at the battle of yellow tavern. so tom went from a high to a very deep low, just in a matter of minutes because he thought highly of stewart and he was said he would not be able to see him again at least not on this earth. so the first engagement that he precipitated with the first virginia was wilson's war or cannon landing, it actually has a third name. you'll notice a lot of these battles of two names, some of them have a lot of names. fort pocahontas, you don't hear that much, but it's all the same thing. tom was so happy to be back fighting with the first virginia. about a week after wilson's war, about six miles to north of richmond at hall shops and, that you've probably been there. it was an all cavalry engagement, the day before the

fighting at all shop tom and received paperwork from the war department notifying him that he had been promoted to corporal. so he's pretty happy, he finally got a promotion, and in the battle of paul shot, the head is not football enough. that led to amputation, i'll speak a little bit more about that in just a minute. back to kelly's ford, and i have to think george spoke, there are a lot of people who make maps or books, but in my opinion george scope is the best of the best. he did a fabulous job. this is a small version of the full page map in the book. i will point out this stonewall here which is still standing on the battlefield of tallies for. i was there on the anniversary of the battle, st. patrick's

day, and i walked out the crack of dawn that morning and mocked every thought of that will. it's 300 yards. and with 23 degrees that morning. and in tom's writings, he never mentioned anything about it being cold that morning. but he had been fighting dismounted, and he was trained earlier dismounted as a sharpshooter. he had a special carbine fitted to assist him in that objective. hall shot was fought in sort of three ways. this map is about wave one wave too

woods, is crossing here in -- he's rapidly increasing numbers. all of these confederates, tom and others are behind that stone wall, ready to be overrun.

probably captured, taken as prisoners. he did say anything about the weathered, but he had on a heavy overcoat. he did write that he had decided and, i do not know why, maybe will be more comfortable, he decided before he mounted up that he was going to take the coat off. so, he took the heavy coat off, took it over the back of the saddle, already had his left hand on the palm, and getting ready to swing right leg over. -- it penetrated to about the naval area, it hit something, deflected and exited his back a fraction of an inch from his fine. and then in the 19th century medical knowledge, it wound like that, there is nothing surgeons can do for you. so, tom is a lying there in the mud, he had a pocket watch that belong to his father --

-- they would end up in a federal prison, and they gave his car -- here he is. he is lying in the mud waiting to die and who knows how many federal cavalry troopers that road by tom, and there was one in the 16th pennsylvania cavalry, and he rode over to tom and he dismounted. he got down on his hands and needs, on a handkerchief, patted tom's hand. or his head, rather. he saw -- you know, this guy still alive. he looks pretty bad but, he is still alive. so, the trooper, the guy from -- i can't use his name, because tom collins never knew the man's name, that probably saved his life. he had a few regrets, tom.

but that was a big. one he spent the rest of his life trying to find the man who saved his life. so that he could shake his hand, get to know his name and say, thank you. and he was never able to do so. there is still a lot of fighting left, this was march of 1863 now whomever that trooper from pennsylvania was could've been killed the next week, the next month or the day before the surrender happened at his courthouse. so this trooper from pennsylvania he gets down on his hands and knees, he takes a quick look at tom and says, son, there is nothing we can do for you. you have minutes left to live, the best that we can offer is if there's something that we can do to make you comfortable. and tom was somewhat acquainted with the weekly family. he knew there farmhouse, it was long gone. but it was about there on the

field of battle. and tom told at the surgeon, i guess at rather die in their home then lying out here in the mud. so, the trooper from pennsylvania picked him up, carried him to an ambulance. the wagon goes up to the weekly bar in house, where the pa and gets -- comfortable on the floor. he goes out the door, tom never sees him again. jeff stewart arrives with reinforcements, they counter charge, they drive federalists from the field, a few hours have gone by. one of the first confederate cavalry troopers and the front door of the weekly farmhouse is one of tom's cousins, and he saw him lying there, and he said i thought i saw you die two hours ago. he was still alive and his condition was so delicate that the surgeons were afraid to move him. so, they came into the home for several weeks and treated him

there. and it is a miracle. i think, as i explained a little bit more about tom's story, hopefully it will make sense. i think it probably was only by the grace of god that tom survived that. he had no way of knowing that at the time. but there are no other explanations. again, i'm not going to get gross about the amputation at halls shop on the 28th of may 1864. but, the surgeon, they amputated tom's foot on the field. and they threw him in the back of a wagon, went bouncing on the way to richmond, and they must not have given tom anything for pain. he did not say that the bandaged the amputation, they would've had to, or he would have bled to death. but he was in excruciating pain

-- i think he was trying to qualify for the -- on his way to the hospital in richmond. and it got could so bad that tom always carried at least one revolver stuck down in the front of his trousers, and he pulled the gun out, cocked it, put the -- and i will not repeat exactly word for word what he said with the gun talk to the back of the ambulance driver's head. but he got the message across, if i will not -- if you don't slow down this wagon, and a bloody rains out over the top of. it so, the guy slows the wagon down. then they get into richmond. and he got lost. it took him three hours to find the old jackson hospital, which stood not far from within sight. very close to hollywood cemetery in richmond. , the old jackson hospital, the surge in their went ballistic when they saw the amputation.

they demanded to know, and they went on a witch hunt, whatever happened to this guy, tom probably never knew if he did, if he didn't write about it. the surgeon of that amputated his foot on the battlefield in the halls shop was intoxicated. and he botched the amputation with capital be. and the surgeons in richmond, they learned a lot. he wrote very detailed information about what the surgeons did and contrary to popular belief and opinion, here all of these horror stories the surgeons were so bad, and the hospitals were just atrocious. tom actually had some very good things to say about the surgeons and specifically the old jackson hospital. this on the far left is the only unknown photograph of that church in washington county where i spoke in july of 2016.

it looks absolutely nothing like that today. then, it was a one room, very small little building. today it is a modern brick structure, probably ten times the size of this one. in 1866, when they got the idea of building at this church, tom kollie owned the land. also, tom kollie, these are his words not mine, was drunk 24 hours a day. he had a very violent temper. and he was withdrawn from society and oh by the way, while he was drawn 24 hours a day, he was serving as deputy sheriff of the county. and he donated the land for them to build this church on. was he ever going to see ever set foot in the church at that point in time? had you asked him, he would have said no way.

and he would not have said it that cleanly. but i think it was probably god speaking to him, i've saved your life at calories forward, you should have died. and, you know, thomas battle -- battling the demons of ptsd. and i'll talk a little bit more about that in just a minute. it brings the land, he has some to breonna's property, he had some of the trees cut down. he donated some lumber to help them build the church. little did he know that a few years later in 1872, he is going to median lady that probably saved his life. this in the middle is tom's bible, this is the inside of the front cover. this is the actual bible, king james version. his great granddaughter has. that she let them borrow the

bible, and i went through every page, from the old testament to the new testament. a few places tom had made remarks on certain passages of scripture. and then i came to second samuel, chapter 22, versus seven. i don't know if he was trying to make asterisks or not. if he, was he was about as good at making them as i am. but there were quite a few of these marks. and i will read it to you because i know it is a little bit hard probably for you to see from where you are sitting. in my distress i called up on the lord, and i cried to my god, and he did hear my voice, out of his temple and my cry did enter into his ears. in all seven volumes of tom's journals, he did not mention any particular passage of scripture. however, he did say when he was lying in the floor of the wheatley farmhouse, and every surgeon that looked at him said, son, i'm sorry, you're going to

die. you are not going to make it. he was holding this bible. and he mentioned in his writings that occasionally he would read three passages of scripture. i do not know about you, but if i've been shot like he was shot and everyone that's examined me tells me, son, you're not going to make it. this particular passage i think would have a special meaning for me. let's see here... this thing is supposed to... ok, well, there they all jump together, ptsd. i will briefly touch on that. tom eventually benefited from something starting with meeting and marrying an elijah. and i'll show you a picture just in a moment of both of them together. they eventually had 12 children. four of them died, either at childbirth or shortly after,

which was all too common in that part of the 19th century. not long ago, i finished reading a book on federal veterans after the end of the war that were suffering from what we now know as post-traumatic stress disorder. we did not even give that a name until after the troops started coming home from vietnam. they were still learning about that. but i've talked to specialists in that field, and i have read tom's writings, they've told me, if you go down the list of the ptsd symptoms tom had virtually every single one of them. and i think, this book, i was referencing in a moment ago about federal veterans suffering from ptsd, it is shocking the number that eventually committed suicide. and i'm not standing here in telling you that tom kollie

would eventually committed suicide. i have no way of knowing that. but i can tell you that he was headed down a very dark path. and here the two of them are together little tricked photography have learned something here in this process. i think today we stop learning is the day we die i did not know that that part of the 19th century that when the bride and groom were photographed on their wedding day, christmas 1872 this picture was taken, it was considered proper if the bride or the groom was much

taller so they would elevate so they would appear to be exactly the same height. why is it was a foot shorter than tom. anna lies, you can see the picture it can barely see the legs of the stool she was standing on. his tom's grandson has a photograph, it has no photographers name on the image, so i do not know who to credit with that, but this guy was very good. he must have gotten the measuring stick because they appear to be see the identical same height. the sad part about ptsd, amputations and everything else, is that there is nothing pretty about war. our servicemen and women are still suffering from that today when they come back home, and i have had an opportunity to speak with some of the wounded warriors. and it is sad, many of them do not have a family to speak of.

they are not involved in the church. analyze the first thing she did was get tom off the bottle, got him cleaned up, got him sober, got him involved in the church and he had given them the land to build a church upon and some of the building materials. he was baptized in that church, and eventually became a leading member of the community. but i don't know that any that would've happened had it not been for this young lady that you are looking at on the screen now. and of course than having a large, support of family network is very, very important still today to our servicemen and women. 1897 -- fast forwarding a little bit, i'm almost done. i have my time, or have four minutes and 38 seconds left. thomas broke, he had gone into

several different business ventures, including going over into kentucky and doing some mining work for andrew carnegie, and several other things. and he and another gentleman who tom trusted i gone into business together and open a store in southwest virginia, mercantile that was actually doing very well. and this business partner turned out to be a crook -- during the wee hours of the night he went in and he had several other people within, they stole all the inventory out of the story. they took all the money out of the cash register, and the even stole the cash register. so tom lost every penny that he had invested, he was absolutely broke. so he and anna lies and all eight children moved to south

carolina and went to work in this textile mill that you are looking at, from 1897 towards the latter part of 1899, the entire family worked in this building six days a week from sun up to sundown, and tom writes in great detail about life was like how tough was they had some children who were very young, they swept the floors and other things. there was something for everybody to do, and they eventually made enough money that they got back on their feet financially and they were able to come back home to washington county. tom loved to travel. when he came back to washington county, that is when he really started writing extensively, and he loved to travel. if you had turned the clock back a few years, you probably would've not seen tom kollie at reunions, because one of the

symptoms of ptsd which is still valid today with our service men and women, when they come back from iraq or afghanistan or wherever, the last thing they want to do is be around people they served with. and early on, tom probably would have not been seen in a photograph like this, but he went to several of the united confederate veteran reunions. this happens to be a reunion of the first virginia cavalry. they had a reunion everywhere somewhere different in virginia. this one happened to be and addington, so tom did not offer to travel for this one. i think this was in 1902. this is tom's grave site, and i know it is hard to see from where you are sitting. the stones weathered a little bit, it was clean, you should've seen it before they cleaned, you could not read anything on it.

he is buried from about here to the back wall behind the church. he gave them the land to build a church on, and had no intentions of going into the church until he met anna liza. most of the rest of the family are interred down to the left, that is where he and anna liza rest. but he was buried with his rank of corporal, which he received one day before he lost his foot at the battle. this is the final slide in the only thing i'm going to read -- i have one minute left. as soon as i saw this picture, it instantly became one of my favorites. i got this from his grandson bob in florida. this is tom in the center and his two older sons in their uniforms. we know where they are getting ready to go. washington county was the departure point for all of the dubois's of all the counties

and all of southwestern virginia that we're getting ready to board the ships to go across the big pond, so to speak and fight in world war i. and you can see in this image the only one really that tom does not have his crutches or a cane. anytime he was photographed, and like i mentioned earlier, he was photographed quite a bit because he eventually became a very prominent citizen, he always removed his artificial left foot. i think that was sort of his badge of honor, and to ensure that his two sons are propping their dad up so that he doesn't topple over. but i think it's an amazing photograph and i close with this because i think it goes very well with tom's obituary. we remember the 100th

anniversary of tom's death on september the 24th of this year. that means that historians don't do math, so i had to sit down and ask my wife maker do the math. that means 1919, right? i'm kidding, i can at least do that much matt. 100 years ago. and many years before he passed, no one asked tom to do the, certainly no one told him to do this. he thought it was the proper and right thing to do. he tried to keep tabs on all the comrades he had served with in the first virginia. wherever they were, and they had scattered to the four corners. there were some in california, texas, all over the country, and whenever they died, tom wrote their obituaries and sent them to the newspapers. well, now tom has passed.

it was not common in those days at all for people to pre write their own obituaries i know some people do that today i don't plan to do that, and tom didn't do that either. i found his obituary in the archives at appalachians state university in boone, north carolina. they have no idea who gave it to them or how long they have had it. all they could tell me was we had it long before anybody had ever heard the word computer. but i was able -- it's four pages and one of the comrades that it served with tom and knew him very well on a promise i will read all four pages. a mulligan read the last three sentences because i think they work well with this photograph. so tom's obituary closed by saying this. he was one of the most daring confederate soldiers in the cavalry service. he was a man of power powerful

physique and most conspicuous in any crowd, clad as he always was in a suit of gray. he took great interest and looking after the welfare of all his comrades. thank you all very much. among [applause] i couldn't do that again if i tried. a the church of washington county there kelly's chapel? it's not too far away less than ten miles from kelly's chapel. a really? i'll be happy to take questions. yes sir. >> his prosthetic foot did he make it or did he buy it?

>> great question. the teachers me coming out, the question was did his pathetic prosthetic foot, did he make of daily by? it was given to him by the commonwealth of virginia. they gave him one early on, he hated it, and he threw it away. they gave him another one, it hurt his stump. you know when you have an amputation to take your foot off at the ankle, and he threw that one away as well. and eventually, as prosthetics improved, they finally did give him one that was comfortable and he would wear it, and he did where it, unless he was having his photograph taken. every single picture of him that i've ever seen he does not have the artificial foot on. so i have to believe that was sort of his badge of honor, so to speak.

yes sir. his hand was up. next >> to his sons both survived world war one? >> they both survived both, of his son survived and they were able to return back to the united states and spend some time at least with their father before he died in september of 1919. didn't spend a lot of time with their dad, but they got to spend a little time with him. a song hand somewhere and then i lost. it oh yes. >> what type of work to tom do after the civil war, and what kind of physical labor minus the foot, kind of business was ian? >> question was what kind of business did tom do after the war? he served the, first job he had was deputy sheriff of the county and it's an amazing part, he wrote extensively about that. here is mounted on horseback,

and he was not wearing the artificial foot because it was one he hated and he had already thrown it away. and he's chasing someone, that is just robbed a bank, and thomas thinking to himself, please don't let them dismount. as long as they stay on horseback, i'm good, i can chase them. if he gets close enough he, carried a couple of revolvers he can apprehend them. he did that, he mentioned the mining business you went to briefly in kentucky. there were probably ten or 12 other jobs, anything you can think of. and eventually served as commissioner of revenue for the county. he was over the poor house. you know what that means. that's what they call the compounds or houses for people that really were destitute, that had nothing, most of the counties here in the commonwealth and many other states have them. they would go there to live and

be tended to and before provided with food. tom was over that for a period of time. he did a lot of things. he still farmed some up until he died, but nothing obviously real hard, is manual labor, with the foot. and ironically, that wound that would've killed any of us in this room -- in 1863 never gave him any problems. he did have problems with a botched amputation although the surgeons in richmond cleaned it up and made it much better than it probably would've been, but that wound is just a miracle. i spoke to people the people in a national museum of civil war meta medicine path as the, maryland, they're scratching their heads. starting his case right now. because of the type of wound,

and no one can explain how he possibly could've lived. the surgeons initially there major concern once they got the blight bleeding stopped, which was not easy, they thought that the mini ball had struck is fine and they were afraid he was going to be paralyzed. i don't know how in the world many ball would travel right through the middle of the torso hits something and deflecting that come out the back, and not hit any vital organs. i mean, that was just -- like i said i think god had something else in store for him the tom didn't know about at that point in his life. then i see a hand over here somewhere? well thank you all again very much. [applause]

>> during the civil war, animals served in a variety of roles from transporting supplies to acting as regimental mascots. next, brad stone talks about general leads hen, jeff davis, the marching pig, -- and dug at the camel. the national museum of civil war medicine hosted this program, they provided the video. >> hi there, i am brad a stone with the national museum of civil war medicine. and i'm here today to talk about the role that animals play during the civil war.