by John C. Bush
CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 286 pages
REVIEWED BY WILLIAM G. MCATEE
John Bush skillfully weaves together this historically accurate narrative of a so-called “Patriot” — a Southerner with Union loyalties — inspired by his wife’s great-great grandfather from North Alabama. Bush draws on actual ancestral memories to create a fictionalized “story of real people” in “the time and place of actual historical events.”
The story’s protagonist, First Sergeant Thomas Benton Files, along with others from North Alabama, joined the First Alabama Calvary, United States Volunteers. Files’ motivation stemmed from patriotic Federal sentiments learned from his progenitor, Captain John Files, hero of the Revolutionary War Battle of Cowpens. “My grandpa and his daddy fought to make this Union back in ’76, and I can’t sit by and let these Secesh [secessionists] take it a apart without putting up a fight. We’re Patriots and we ain’t taking any part with this rebellion against the United States of America.”
Such passion put Files in double jeopardy on his grueling circuitous trek in a blue uniform across Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee, Kentucky, Illinois, Indiana, back to Kentucky, Tennessee and finally Alabama. Sgt. Files was seen as a turncoat when encountering Confederates and a Confederate spy among Federals. He held the dubious distinction of being a prisoner of war in a Confederate prison first, then a Federal one.
His choice also endangered his family, labeled akin to traitors, who remained in Rebel territory at the mercy of the “Secesh” home guard that administered “homespun justice” for such betrayal long after Appomattox. The family spent hard anxious years not knowing the fate of Sgt. Files while they barely eked out a living in his absence.
Almost three years passed when a ragged skeleton-like figure, “with shaggy hair and a wild full beard,” limped slowly up the lane as the fragment of a blue uniform flapped in the breeze. “Look, Ma. It’s Pa! It’s Pa!” Bush adeptly alternates the storyline between vividly described daily activities to reconstruct shattered family life with homey fireside gatherings telling his harrowing war adventures.
The simple elegance of Bush’s word pictures and speech patterns give new tangible flesh and blood insight into the agony experienced by all involved. He fills in gaps between “Patriot” and “Rebel” perspectives, all the while shattering commonly repeated myths and stereotypes about both.
There is much more here for the present and future than just the past. Late in the journey, through tears over his lost family, ole Johnston addressed Sgt. Files with the words of Thomas Jefferson from “The Federalist Papers.” He spoke about “problems when folks started choosing up sides for a fight” based on “ambition, greed, personal prejudices and other such motives.” Contemporary lesson in a polarized world: Both (all) sides need to remember what he said!
A very worthwhile, easy read for those across the age spectrum.
WILLIAM G. MCATEE is a retired Presbyterian minister and author of “Transformed: A White Mississippi Pastor’s Journey into Civil Rights and Beyond.”
