I was searching the net for information about the Home Guard in North Georgia and came across this thread. In researching and writing about the Home Guard activities of an ancestor I've learned to read everything with a critical mindset. My ancestor's activities were with a unit known locally as "McCollum's Scouts." They served mainly in Pickens and Cherokee Counties from about September 1864 until the end of the war. Local histories written in the late 1800s and early 1900s had little positive to say about the Home Guard. I suppose that's related to the "winner's write history" axiom. When you combine this biased "history" with family lore passed down over time, you end up with a lot of distortions. Don't get me wrong, the Home Guard in general, and McCollum's Scouts in particular, did some pretty ugly things. The Home Guard was not a homogeneous organization. Some companies and regiments were officially commissioned by Governor Joe Brown and functioned as reasonably well-disciplined paramilitary units. Others were little more than bands of marauders who preyed on the local population instead of protecting them. It was not unusual for these units to clash with each other. Home Guardsmen were predominantly men who were too young or too old to be in the regular forces. However, there was a considerable number of veteran Confederate soldiers leading and serving in the Home Guard. In my ancestor's case, he had served more than three years as a cavalryman in the Army of Northern Virginia with Georgia's Phillip's Legion Cavalry. He came home on furlough in April 1864 with his wounded brother and was scheduled to return to his unit in August. When Sherman moved into northwest Georgia he stayed to protect his home and was listed as AWOL on Phillip's Legion Cavalry rosters after August. In September he was commissioned a captain by Governor Brown and was later identified in official orders and inspection reports as "Colonel McCollum." He commanded a regiment of reserves (Home Guard) but probably never had more than 100 men under his command. His unit was responsible for restoring order in an area with strong Union sympathy. They looked for, arrested, and sometimes executed Union spies. They also drove out Union sympathizers, sometimes burning their homes. Another of their missions was to track down and arrest marauders. After the war there were several attempts to try my ancestor for his wartime Home Guard activities, but the legislature and the courts ruled that what he did was legal. As late as 1873 a lynch mob from Pickens County abducted him, but he escaped. The Atlanta Constituion carried a number of articles throughout the 1870s about scrapes he got into over his Home Guard service. He became a lawyer and moved from Cherokee County to Henry County. In 1880 he was murdered in an incident apparently not related to the war. This is a somewhat long-winded way of saying that the Home Guard had many faces and the face presented in Cold Mountain, while accurate, is not the only one. But it is the one that will put the most people in theater seats.