"Having Surrendered Their Arms, the War, to Them, Was Over"

"Having Surrendered Their Arms, the War, to Them, Was Over". Citronelle, Surrender Site. , On April 30, 1865, C.S. General Richard Taylor, by then back in Meridian, received a wire from U. S. General Edward Canby. The truce negotiated at Magee Farm, Canby informed him, must end in 48 hours, because Washington had rejected the Johnston-Sherman Contention on which it was based. However, Canby would accept Taylor's surrender on the same terms that Grant had offered Lee. Soon after, Taylor learned that Johnston had agreed to Grant's terms and surrendered on April 26., Virtually surrounded by tens of thousands of bluecoats, Taylor faced a stark choice. He could surrender or divide his army into guerilla bands and continue the fight. Feeling this latter notion absurd, he quickly rejected it, warning a subordinate that any men who attempted this would be “hunted down like beasts of prey…” Taylor had no room to hesitate: “Folly and madness combined would not have justified an attempt to prolong a hopeless contest.” Taylor accepted Canby's proposal on May 2., Accompanied by Commodore Ebenezer Farrand, the commander of the Mobile naval squadron, Taylor once again took a handcar south from Meridian. Here, on May 4, 1865, he and Farrand met Canby and Admiral Henry Thatcher and surrendered their army and naval forces, including their artillery, ordnance, and quartermaster and commissary stores. The surrender, Taylor later recalled, was on terms consistent with the honor of Confederate arms. Officers were allowed to keep their side arms and mounted men, their horses. The men's paroles would be signed by their own officers and turned over to Federal officers by them. Taylor, who was to be given food to feed his men, also retained control of the railways and river steamers so his troops could get home. Finally, Canby agreed to send officers to Meridian to receive the Confederate paroles and stores. Taylor appreciated Canby's goodwill and generosity and Canby, in turn, found Taylor to be helpful with advice and scrupulously honest in the execution of their agreement., Farrand's squadron surrendered to U.S. Naval personnel on the Tombigbee River between May 10 and 11. On May 5 Maury's men, still at Cuba Station, learned that they had been surrendered as prisoners of war. On the 7th they broke camp and, piling their guns on ordnance wagons or leaning them on trees by the road, returned to Meridian. Arriving on the 9th, they rejoined part of the Blakeley garrison , also there to be paroled. Though deeply saddened by a sense of failure and personal loss, Taylor’s men were relieved to receive their paroles without ceremony, seeing little of the Federal soldiers. By May 14 most of the ex-rebels had broken camp for the last time. Many embarked on river steamers and returned to Mobile in the company of numerous Yankees., ”The men that hailed us from these crowded decks wore the dress with which we were familiar. In lieu of defiant shouts and musket volleys, they hailed and were greeted as friends. Having surrendered their arms, the war, to them, was over, and all its bitterness past and buried. With that frank, courtly regard which the brave entertain for those they have tried by fire, no time was lost in establishing the most friendly feeling between the ‘blue and the gray.’” , J.T. Woods, Surgeon, 99th Ohio Infantry, For more information, visit www.battleofmobilebay.com or call 1-800-745-SAND or 1-800-5MOBILE.