The Turnbo Manuscripts
by Silas Claiborne Turnbo
1844-1925
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A TERRIBLE EXPERIENCE IN THE CIVIL WAR
By S. C. Turnbo
On the night of the 31st of August, 1906, I saw a man of the name of Jim Thomas at Mr. Bud Sherrod’s, who lives near Hercules in Taney County, Missouri. Mr. Thomas said he lived at Brown Branch on Beaver Creek and was only a small boy during the great struggle between the North and South 1861-5. In relating war time reminiscences he said that he met an ex-federal soldier who lived on Swan Creek in Christian County, Missouri, who informed him that he served in the war from the beginning to the end and that received 13 wounds in the battles of the war that he took part in. He showed me the scars that was left after the wounds had healed over and it seemed unreasonable to think how he could survive the war. Part of them were flesh wounds and other were organic. He certainly bore a charmed life. A bullet had broke his right arm and the result was a piece of bone six inches in length had come out. This man also informed me that on one occasion his company went into a battle with 80 men and 74 were killed and the other six were wounded, including himself. "I have forgotten this man’s name," said Mr. Thomas "but he died on Swan Creek in 1894, but I disremember where he is buried."
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