I have a Great Great Grandfather who fought for the C.S.A., 27th Texas Cavalry. We have some information on him, but some of the documents and information I've been able to dig up seem only to create more questions. I'd appreciate any help that can be given or advice that can be shared.

Bill Nolan, from your many posts regarding the 27th (as part of the larger Whitfield - Ross Texas Cavalry Brigade) you appear to know quite a bit about this subject ... maybe you can help shine some light on this? :-)

Details follow (let me apologize in advance for the novel below) ...

Thanks!

William (Bill) Acuff
Columbia, TN

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My Great Great Grandfather, one Richard William Acuff (known to everyone as simply "R.W.", which is how he appears on the muster rolls), was born in 1841 in Maury County, Tennessee. I'm not sure how old he was when he and his family left the state, but at some point prior to his twentieth birthday his family moved to Daingerfield, Texas (Titus County), and on February 26, 1862, he was mustered into service by Captain Robert J. Brailsford, at Lee’s Creek, Arkansas. Eventually R.W. and the others with him were organized into Company A (known as the “Titus Invincibles”), of the 27th Texas Cavalry.

I've read a lot of things on the internet about the 27th Texas Cavalry; unfortunately there is very little in the books that I have (none of them specific enough). I'd like to know more about the 27th, particularly Co. A. I'd surely like to be able to know what was going on in this ancestor of mine's life from February 1862 forward ... or at least learn of the battles and skirmishes in which he was involved. But first, I need to understand something a little more specific.

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We have copies of Company Muster Rolls, Rolls of Prisoners of War, and other documentation, as follows:

- Company Muster Rolls Jan and Feb, 1862 through May and June, 1863 (eight separate muster rolls detailing service over a period of roughly 18 months) all show R.W. as "present" ... the final roll states that he'd been “last paid” ... “to April 30, 1863” by Captain R. J. Lee (AQM).

- July and August, 1863, show R.W. as “absent” … “Captured on retreat from Big Black” (more on this, later) and show the same “last paid” notes as the previous muster roll.

- May and June, 1864, show R.W. as “absent” … “Absent in arrest prison” and same “last paid” notes as previous muster roll.

- Roll of Prisoners of War (undated) states that R.W. was captured at Vicksburg, and paroled, on the same date: July 4, 1863. I have read that Grant felt as if the survivors couldn't fight any longer, therefore he paroled them immediately?

- We have a copy of a document where the title is cut off; I'm not even sure what it is, but it appears to be some kind of parole agreement: "That I will not take up arms again against the United States ... until duly exchanged by the proper authorities." ... it's dated July 12, 1863, in Vicksburg; R.W. signed this document.

- A Roll of Prisoners of War for May 13, 1865, states that R.W. Acuff, Pvt. Co. A, appears on a "Roll of Prisoners of War of 1st Squadron of Whitfield's Legion, Ross' Brig. Texas Cavalry, Confederate States Army, commanded by R. J. Brailsford, Capt., surrendered at Citronelle, Ala., by Leiut. Gen. R. Taylor, C.S.A., to Maj. Gen. E.R.S Canby, U.S.A, May 4, 1865, and paroled at Jackson, Miss, May 13, 1865."

- Long after the war, in 1899, R.W. applied for a pension from the State of Tennessee; we have several of the documents that were involved in that process, including one from the War Department, Military Secretary's Office: after referring to his membership of Co. A in the 27th, states that he "surrendered at Citronelle, Alabama, May 4, 1865, and that he was paroled at Jackson, Mississippi, May 13, 1865."

- We have a document from J.W. Phillips, County Clerk of Morris County, Texas, where two members of the 27th Cavalry, Co. A Captain Jasper N. Zachary and Co. A Pvt. Henry D. M. Rice, vouched for R.W. as character witnesses, adding that "he was a good soldier ever ready to do his duty", and signed the document.

- We have two "medals" ... one, entitled "Forrest Cavalry Corps", bears a silver coin-like image of Forrest; the other is entitled "21st Reunion; Little Rock, May 16-17-18" ... both of these bear two versions of the Confederate flag. We know nothing else about these medals, for all we know they could both have been handed out to everyone in attendance at a reunion of those ever organized under Forrest.

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We have more but this is plenty to get me started; upon reviewing this information it appears that after serving for roughly 17 months R.W. was captured near Vicksburg (unfortunately I don't know exactly which battles he might have been involved in, because I can't nail down exactly when his company was created and attached to the 27th ... there is much conflicting information on the timing: March 1862, "late 1862", etc).

However, his own statements (when applying for the pension), the second Roll of POWs, and the War Department document all seem to indicate that he was captured (again) at the close of the war. So he fought, was captured and paroled, fought again, was captured (again) and paroled (again)?

We don't have any other documentation to indicate, one way or another, what he was doing between July 1863 and May 1865. Following the war he settled in Brownsville, Tennessee, for reasons completely unknown to me.

I'd certainly like to know more about all of this, but at the moment I'd settle for two things:

1) A better idea of what battles the 27th (when R.W. was serving in Company A) were involved in

2) What R.W. was doing between the Vicksburg parole in 1863 ... and the Jackson, MS parole in May 1865. He didn't fall off the face of the earth, and given that after the war he settled, married, fathered 12 children, and lived out the rest of his life in Haywood County (West TN, near Jackson), I strongly doubt that he went back "home" to Texas for two years only to then return to Tennessee, alone, to settle there.

There are many possibilities, and I realize that some of those possibilities could reflect more or less favorably upon him than others. This research has become somewhat important to me and to my 12 year-old son ... both of us are named William, as were about ten other males in my family; obviously that is not by coincidence.

I suspect that some of the assumptions on my part haven't been very good ones (I have a Bachelor's Degree in history but I am by no means an expert on any of this, or on any other facet of history, for that matter). Any help would be greatly appreciated ...

Thanks so much for your time and patience,

William (Bill) Acuff
Columbia, TN