My family moved to my grandparents’ farm, which is located about three miles from the small town of Silver Run, Maryland, along one of the main highways leading from Baltimore and to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. The Battle of Gettysburg, the last battle of the Civil War, was fought there.
My grandmother often told one story of their experiences during that battle. They had started to build a new brick house, and my mother was a baby at that time. The farm, while located in Maryland, was close to the Pennsylvania line. It was about 16 miles to Gettysburg from where we lived.
My grandmother told me they could easily hear the noise from the battlefield, and the noise from the cannons and guns was terrific. My grandmother told how the soldiers came through on horseback, passed their home, jumped the horses over fences and gates, made a tour of the buildings and went to the springhouse.
The springhouse was built right by a large spring and was so arranged with a wooden trough built in the house so the water from the spring ran in one end of the trough and out the other end.
The milk was kept in stone jars in the springhouse trough. The soldiers drank all the milk and took anything else they could find to eat. Grandmother said the place sure looked a wreck after they had left.
Mrs. General Montgomery
Lebanon, Missouri
Back in 1955 a call went out from the editors of the then CAPPER’s Weekly asking for readers to send in articles on true pioneers. Hundreds of letters came pouring in from early settlers and their children, many now in their 80s and 90s, and from grandchildren of settlers, all with tales to tell. So many articles were received that a decision was made to create a book, and in 1956, the first My Folks title – My Folks Came in a Covered Wagon – hit the shelves. Nine other books have since been published in the My Folks series, all filled to the brim with true tales from CAPPER’s readers, and we are proud to make those stories available to our growing online community.
