THE TRAGIC DEATH OF SALLIE DURHAM.

The closing days of the war—A sketch of the Durham family—The death of Sallie.

On the 9th of April, 1865, at Appomattox Court House, Lee had surrendered his army of twenty-five thousand men to Grant with his four-fold forces. One after another of the Confederate Generals had been forced to yield to superior numbers, and by the last of May the war was over.

“The North had at the beginning of the strife a population of twenty-two millions; the South had ten millions, four millions of whom were slaves. The North had enlisted during the war two million six hundred thousand troops—the South a little more than six hundred thousand. Now the North had a million men to send home—the South but one hundred and fifty thousand.”

Jefferson Davis had been captured, and imprisoned in Fortress Monroe. Our worn and ragged soldiers had returned to a devastated country. Our entire people were to begin life over again in the midst of poverty, uncertainty, and under the watchful eye of the conqueror. The war was over, but military rule was not.

It was in these transition days, between the fall of “the Lost Cause” and the more stirring events of “Reconstruction,” that there occurred in our little village a most appalling tragedy. To understand it fully, my readers should know something of the young lady’s family. Let us pause here and take a backward glance.

About a hundred years ago Lindsey Durham, a Georgia boy of English descent, graduated from a Philadelphia Medical College and located in Clarke county, in his native State. Drugs were expensive, as they could not be obtained nearer than Savannah, Charleston or New York. Being surrounded by frontiersmen and Indians, he could but notice the efficacy of the native barks and roots used by them as medicines. He was thus led to adopt to a large extent the theories of the Botanic School. He began to cultivate his own medicinal plants, and to prosecute with much zeal his botanical studies and researches. He even went to Europe and procured seeds and plants of medicinal value, until finally his garden of medicinal herbs and plants contained thirteen acres. So great was his fame that patients began to come to him from adjoining States, and he had to build cottages on his plantation in order to entertain them. His marvellous success brought to him ample compensation. He became a millionaire, and lived in all the old-time splendor. Once, by a loan of money, he rescued the Athens bank from utter failure.

Dr. Lindsey Durham left several sons, all of whom were physicians. The eldest of these, and the most eminent, was Dr. William W. Durham, who was born on his father’s plantation in Clarke county, in 1823. After a collegiate course at Mercer University, he graduated from the Jefferson Medical College of Philadelphia, taking high honors, spending five years in the hospital there, and perfecting himself in surgery. This talented gentleman married Miss Sarah Lowe, of Clarke county, and, four years after her death, he married Mrs. Georgia A. Allen, whose maiden name was Wood, and who was a native of Franklin, Georgia.

With the children of his first marriage and their fair young step-mother, Dr. Durham came to Decatur in 1859. Well do I remember the children; two handsome sons, John and William—two pretty brown-eyed girls, Sarah and Catherine. It is needless to say that a large practice awaited the skillful physician, whose eclectic methods were then comparatively new.

William, the eldest son, went into the Confederate service at the age of sixteen, remaining the entire four years, suffering severely at the siege of Vicksburg, fighting valiantly at the Battle of Atlanta, and coming out of the war the shadow of his former self, with nothing but an old army mule and one silver dollar.

Sarah Durham, called Sallie by her family and friends, was a lovely girl of seventeen. She was tall and graceful; bright, and full of enthusiasm; kind, loving and generous. She had just returned from her grandmother’s plantation, for her father had not sooner dared to have his daughters return, such was the insolence of the straggling Federals.

On the morning of September 1st, 1865, this dear girl arose early and noiselessly with a scheme in her kind heart. The former servants were all gone; her mother was not well, and she would surprise the household by preparing for them a nice breakfast. In fancy we see her, as she treads lightly, and chats softly with her tiny half-sister Jennie, and with a little negro girl who in some way had remained with the family.

The Durham residence, which was on Sycamore street, then stood just eastward of where Col. G. W. Scott now lives. The rear of the house faced the site where the depot had been before it was burned by the Federals, the distance being about 350 yards. Hearing an incoming train, Sallie went to the dining room window to look at the cars, as she had learned in some way that they contained Federal troops. While standing at the window resting against the sash, she was struck by a bullet fired from the train. (It was afterwards learned that the cars were filled with negro troops on their way to Savannah, who were firing off their guns in a random, reckless manner.) The ball entered the left breast of this dear young girl, ranging obliquely downward, coming out just below the waist, and lodging in the door of a safe, or cupboard, which stood on the opposite side of the room. (This old safe, with the mark of the ball, is still in the village.)

The wounded girl fell, striking her head against the dining table, but arose, and walking up a long hall she threw open the door of her father’s room, calling to him in a voice of distress. Springing from bed, he said:

“What is it, my child?”

“Oh, father,” she exclaimed, “the Yankees have killed me!”

Laying her upon a small bed in the room, her father cut away from her chest her homespun dress and made a hasty examination of the wound. Her horror-stricken mother remembers to this day that awful scene in all its details. But we will draw a veil over the grief of the smitten family, as they stood half paralyzed at this sudden calamity, and looked upon the loved one whom they were helpless to save. Mrs. Durham recalls the fact that the first person who came in was Rev. Dr. Holmes, and that throughout this great trial he and his family were very sympathetic and helpful.

Every physician in the village and city, and her father’s three brothers were summoned, but nothing could be done except to alleviate her sufferings. She could lie only on her right side, with her left arm in a sling suspended from the ceiling. Every attention was given by relatives and friends. Her grandmother Durham came and brought with her the old family trained nurse. Sallie’s schoolmates and friends were untiring in their attentions. Some names that have appeared in previous sketches, will now appear again, for they watched with anxious, loving hearts by the couch where the young sufferer lay. Tenderly let us mention their names, as we tread softly in memory’s sacred halls. Among the constant attendants at her bedside were Mrs. Martha Morgan, Mrs. Hughes, Mrs. Morton, Miss Laura Williams (Mrs. J. J. McKoy), Lizzie and Anna Morton, Mrs. H. H. Chivers, Dr. Jim Brown and John Hardeman. During the week that her life slowly ebbed away, there was another who ever lingered near her, a sleepless and tireless watcher, a young man of a well-known family, to whom this sweet young girl was engaged to be married.Writes Mrs. P. W. Corr, of Hampton, Florida, (formerly Miss Lizzie Morton): “Never can I forget the dreary night when Willie Durham, Kitty Durham and Warren Morton left Decatur with Sallie’s body, which was to be buried in the old family cemetery in Clarke county. Mrs. Durham, who was in delicate health, was utterly prostrated and the doctor could not leave her.” So Dr. Charles Durham managed the funeral arrangements, chartering the car, and Sallie was buried from the old church her grandfather Lowe had built on his own plantation in Clarke county, and laid to rest in the Durham cemetery near by.

Sallie was shot on Friday at 7:30 A. M., and died the following Friday at 3:30 A. M. While she had suffered untold agony, she was conscious to the last. Throughout her illness she manifested a thoughtful consideration for the comfort of others. Especially did she show tender solicitude for her step-mother, insisting that she should not fatigue herself. While anxious to live, she said she was not afraid to die. In her closing hours she told her friends that she saw her own mother, her grandfather Durham, and her uncle Henry Durham (who had died in the Confederate service), all of whom she expected to meet in the bright beyond.

General Stephenson was in command of the Federal Post at Atlanta. He was notified of this tragedy, and sent an officer to investigate. This officer refused to take anybody’s word that Sallie had been shot by a United States soldier from the train; but, dressed in full uniform, with spur and sabre rattling upon the bare floor, he advanced to the bed where the dying girl lay, and threw back the covering “to see if she had really been shot.” This intrusion almost threw her into a spasm. This officer and the others at Atlanta promised to do all in their power to bring the guilty party to justice, but nothing ever came of the promise, so far as we know.

As a singular coincidence, as well as an illustration of the lovely character of Sallie, I will relate a brief incident given by the gifted pen already quoted from: “One of the most vivid pictures of the past in my memory is that of Sallie Durham emptying her pail of blackberries into the hands of Federal prisoners on a train that had just stopped for a moment at Decatur, in 1863. We had all been gathering berries at Moss’s Hill, and stopped on our way home for the train to pass.”

Dr. W. W. Durham lived for nearly twenty years after Sallie’s death. During the war he had enlisted as a soldier, but was commissioned by Dr. George S. Blackie, a Medical Director in the Western Division of the Confederate Army, to the position of Inspector of Medicines for the Fifth Depot. This position was given him because of his remarkable botanical knowledge and power of identifying medicines. After the war he was prominent in the reorganization of the Georgia Medical Eclectic College, but refused to take a professorship on account of an almost overwhelming practice. He was a quiet, earnest, thoughtful man; and highly sympathetic and benevolent in his disposition. His widow, Mrs. Georgia A. Durham, and their daughter, Mrs. Jennie Findley, still reside in Decatur.Dr. W. M. Durham is a successful physician in Atlanta. He holds a professorship in the Georgia Eclectic Medical College, and edits the Georgia Eclectic Medical Journal. Kitty is Mrs. W. P. Smith, of Maxey’s; and John L. Durham is a physician with a large practice, and a large family, living at Woodville, Georgia.

The Durham residence still stands in Decatur, though not upon the same spot. For years a great stain of blood remained upon the floor, as a grim and silent reminder of this most awful tragedy which so closely followed the horrible and cruel war.