A Civil War Story

There is a story told in our family about our ancestor James Richard Pipes. He once received $125 from the federal government as compensation for property that was stolen from his father, Samuel H. Pipes, by Union soldiers during the Civil War. At the time, the family lived near Danville, Kentucky. The soldiers arrived at the Pipes homestead and ransacked the house. It was common for them to take anything they needed, including men of fighting age. Samuel, who was in his early 30s, hid himself inside their feather bed and the rest of the family made the bed on top of him. He was not found by the soldiers.

James Richard was one of six brothers in the house, and his maternal grandfather, John B Jeffries, had six spoons made from six silver dollars that he intended to pass down to his grandsons. One of the Union soldiers found the spoons and took them. James Richard’s mother, Louisa Jane (Jeffries) Pipes, followed the soldier out of the house to their front gate, pleading with him to take anything else from the house, but to leave them the spoons. While they were talking, about 8 or 10 mules ran up to the fence across the road. When the soldier saw them, he handed the spoons back to Louisa. Then he and some of the other soldiers caught the mules, hitched them up, and drove off.

For some time after the war, Samuel H. Pipes contacted the War Department trying to get reimbursed for the mules, but he was ignored. About twenty years later, James Richard took his wife and baby and moved to Bates County, Missouri to start a new life. And about 30 years after that, in 1918, the government finally tracked down the six brothers and paid them for the mules ($125 each). And one of those silver spoons is still owned by a member of our family.