Then my sister, in meek silence, led my horse, briddled and saddled, to the door and assisted me to mount, my crutches on one arm my wounded foot hanging straight down.

Autobiography and reminiscences by John W. Carroll.  

Arriving home my sisters put my horse away.  Stepmother and all the family came out and seated.  We were engaged in a good old-fashioned family circle conversation, for neither they nor I expected, when I was taken away from there the previous winter, that I would ever be home again.  In the midst of this pleasant reunion what should I see but a company of bluecoats, about forty in number, near the house and approaching rapidly.  Escape was impossible even if I had been well; a bald front was my only chance and that a very poor one.  I thought, when I learned that it was a troop of the famous 6th Tenn. Cavalry, U. S. A., Col. Hurst's, noted for their chivalry in killing prisoners, robbing houses, wardrobes, etc., a terror in fact to old men, helpless women and innocent children who happened to be of a Southern turn of mind.  I took up my crutches, hopped out to the gate, put my crippled foot on the fence, addressed them as gentlemen, invited them to alight which they declined to do.  Just here the strategy on my part began.  My belief has ever been that they intended to kill me as their custom usually was on such occasions.  Inquiring my name and rank, and being told, they began to question me upon a great many things, my wounds, my horse, and many other things; I answered to the best advantage.  Finally one of them, a large stout man wearing a pair of green spectacles, rode up near where I was standing with a pistol in hand.  I believed my time had come.  Just at this moment one of the crowd spoke up and said: "That man is telling the truth," referring to me.  After a consultation with each other they turned to me and said they wanted my horse.  To this I replied I had no horse, having lost him when I was wounded; my horse that moment was in the stable.  They then proposed to take me to prison.  To this I, of course, consented, telling them as I had nothing and could not ride they would have to haul me.  They then inquired the way to several different homes of Southern families which I proceeded to give them, though in a very circuitous route, telling them as I could not get away I would be there on their return to which they assented and rode away.  One may imagine, but not realize, how supremely happy I was at this.  My great fears were that they would look about the barn and see that my statements were false but they did not.  I watched the receding column with breathless anxiety, as it slowly passed out of sight.  Then my sister, in meek silence, led my horse, bridled and saddled, to the door and assisted me to mount, my crutches on one arm my wounded foot hanging straight down.  Turning my horse towards the gate he leaped the fence; I felt that I was again for a time at least a free man.  Going in the direction of a friend's house for whom they had inquired and knowing that, to get there first, I must go through the woods and ride rapidly, I pushed on and succeeded in warning the people to put their stock and themselves out of the way.  This accomplished, I started in the direction of home and on going by to warn another Southern family of the raid that was upon them, I rode into this same crowd plundering the house of a Southern man: their horses tied along the yard fence: coming on to them in the manner in which I did it was almost impossible to go back.  So I rode along by the fence, the men in the house looking at me but for some cause they hesitated and did not fire upon me.  Trusting to my good horse, Texas, dangerous as it was I passed them; my beautiful gray horse whose action was good and of whose speed I had no doubt, I gave the word to go and he went by in such speed that in a moment of time I had passed and turned down the hill out of their sight and out of range of their shots.  I continued my ride deep into the bottom.  The wound in my foot by this time bled quite freely and it was considerably swollen by swinging down so long.  When I was fully safe, I dismounted and remained two days before I was again able to move.