One hundred fifty years ago, on April 26, 1864, Capt. Benjamin Pearson of the 36th Iowa Infantry sees the aftermath of the fight at Marks’ Mills: April 26. At 7 Oc A M, I got a written permit from A T Robertson & also from Hamit Pinson, Confederate Seargs at Dockerys Hospital & Robertson at Cranes hospital; to go over the battle field & to the different hospitals; to look for my son, & I put in the day with diligent search, & an anxious acheing heart & witnessed the fearfull results of earnest war & the picture was a sad one. I saw nor heard anything of my son but the mangled bodys of the dead lay in every imaginable shape over the woods & many of them striped of every stitch of cloths & many of them burnt into a crisp next to the ground as the woods was burnt over, I think the woods took fire from the burning wagons as the Rebs burnt about half of them there are some 60 odd dead horses over the battle ground, & 30 odd dead mules, & the number of Negroes I could not get I saw perhaps near 30, & the Rebs pointed out to me a point of woods where they told me they had killed eighty odd negroes men women & children this is their report to me & it may be true& it may not, I did not see it nor was I in that part of the woods, but I fully believe they are hartless enough to do any act that wicked men or devils could conceive, they left our dead on the field until a flag of truce came out from Pine Bluff & burried them some 3 or 4 days after the battle & the negroes are not & never will be buried until the rains wash the sands over their bleached bones.
Posted on: Sat, 26 Apr 2014 14:00:01 +0000
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