Taken from the book:

A Brief Narrative Of The Fourth Tennessee Cavalry Regiment

by: Adjt. George B. Guild
Nashville, Tenn 1913

Page: 102
When General Williams left Sparta for the Army of Tennessee, at Atlanta, all of the independents and
bushwhackers in that part of the State went out with him. It got so hot thereabout, and the Federals were swarming so in Tennessee (like bees), that they concluded the better part of valor was to get
away. Champ Ferguson, of the one side, and Dave Beatty, of the other, both, I believe, from Fentress
County, were the respective leaders. A warfare had been raging in this part of the State and Southern
Kentucky since the beginning of the war, and some outrageous murders had been perpetrated upon citizens as well as soldiers. The name of each was a terror to one side or the other. Champ Ferguson
and his followers participated actively at Saltville. After the battle was over a Lieutenant Smith, of
the Federal army, was left with others wounded. He was taken to Emory and Henry College, which
was made a hospital for both armies. When Ferguson heard the fact, he went over there and killed
Lieutenant Smith. It was said that Smith had during the war killed a Colonel Hamilton, who was a

Page: 103
comrade, neighbor, and personal friend of Ferguson; that Smith had captured Hamilton after a
fight between members of the two clans, and had been ordered with a squad of soldiers to take him to
headquarters over in Kentucky; but that, after starling with his prisoner and going a short distance, he
ordered his men to take Hamilton to the side of the public road, where he was stood up by a tree and
shot to death.
A short time after the Confederates had returned from the surrender, in May, 1865, Ferguson, who
had surrendered to the Federals, was undergoing trial by court-martial at Nashville. He had been
arrested at Saltville, Va., by order of General Williams for the alleged killing of Smith and sent to
Richmond, as we understood it, and we saw him no more afterwards. The war terminated a short time
after this. I presume in the confusion of things he was permitted to return to his home in Tennessee.
I was told that frequent attempts had been made to capture him; but finally, after being advised and on
being assured by Federal authority that if he would surrender he would be given the same terms that
had been extended to other Confederates, he gave up. After this he was placed on trial by a military
court-martial on various charges of murder. Among others was the charge of the murder of Lieutenant
Smith at Emory and Henry College, in Virginia. He was convicted and executed by hanging at Nash-