I left my home in Maryland, escaped to the desperate hills,
Blue coat soldiers everywhere, I refused to bow or kneel.

Got a real good horse streamed Nanny Pieces and I rode with Grumble Jones.
Somehow I never did fit in with them regular army drums.

But Old Mobstar enter 43rd in early 63 I went up there and tried my hand seemed like the place to be.

We rode that upper valley and we charged them union lines, they might make it down to Richmond but this turnpike road is mine.

We’re ridin’ with the Grey Ghost when I hear that startin’ bell we’d ride into those mountains and we gave those Yankees hell. Takin’ horse, guns and prisoners whatever we could get, they might make it down to Richmond but they ain’t got there yet.

Sometimes we’d make a midnight raid take out those picket posts; charge down through them Union camps like pistol totin’ Ghosts.
Other times we’d hit them Federal trains in one of our attacks, twistin’ up the big steel rails and tearin’ up the tracks.

We patrolled that river turnpike from Fairfax to West Begat; it was many a Yankee soldier who fell into our trap.

We whipped them Loudon Rangers and ol’ General Custer too, every time we knocked them bad boys down our reputation grew.

We’re ridin’ with the Grey Ghost when we hear that startin’ bell we’d ride into those mountains and we’d give those Yankees hell. Takin’ horse, guns and prisoners whatever we could get, they might make it down to Richmond but they ain’t got there yet.

On Sunday 1865 on an Appomattox farm, Bobby Lee met General Grant and Lee lay down his arms.
On the 21st of April on a Friday afternoon, Colonel Mosby sent us home and said then end would be here soon. We just kept on a ridin said he wouldn’t take no oath. If them Yankees want to take us lord they’ll have to catch us both.

Now I’m ridin’ like the Grey Ghost through these Shenandoah hills, hidin from them double yellow, Mosby’s hearts a grill.

Those Southern boys done lost the war but I got no regrets, those Yankees just might shoot me down but they ain’t got me yet!

Snakebite

Much is made of his height in just about every account. As 5′ 8 was ‘average’ those days, one could hardly expect that any mention would have been made at all had he been between 5 foot 7 and 9 as he would have been ‘average’. He wasn’t.

However, it is also to be remembered that height then – as now – was a criteria for power and importance. Nobody wanted to state that an important man like Mosby was that small, so he ‘grew’ in the telling of his story. But you will notice that in every account, Mosby’s ‘littleness’ is clearly defined and yet, the same people who own that he was ‘little’, continue to put him at between 5 foot 6 and 5 foot 10! Furthermore, Mosby had a pronounced ‘stoop’ to his shoulders and carried his head well forward which also would have diminished his height – at least standing.

Another testimony to his fraility and lack of physical size and strength is that Mosby had at least three horses ‘run away’ with him and he almost had another do the same thing when he was ill with what he called ‘a cold’, but given the symptoms was probably the flu. He wanted to go after Blazer, but was so weak that his horse almost carried him away again and his men begged him to remain behind in safety. Realizing that he would be more of a hindrence than a help in the encounter, Mosby sent one of his commanders with his troop and told him to ‘wipe out’ Blazer; they did.

Mosby’s power was in his courage, his care for his men and his strong personality which was conveyed by his eyes (that ‘window to the soul’). One biographer said that he became enraged during one battle and was ‘a devil with eyes even his men feared’. Jeffry Wert said that Mosby was the ‘most lethal’ man he had ever studied.

Of course, the Yankees portrayed him as ‘Jack Mosby’ the Guerrilla, a HUGE hairy fellow with a great black beard and long black hair whose sweetheart seduced Union officers to gain information for her evil lover. According to such accounts, Mosby cut prisoners to pieces with a huge saber or shot them with the many pistols he carried on his person (actually, Mosby’s hands were so small that he had to use a smaller caliber revolver than most of his men because he could not handle the larger ones!). It was also said that he hung Union soldiers over fires to torture information out of them. Indeed, over the course of his career as a partisan, the man became such an object of curiosity that when one Union cavalry troop brought in some prisoners (none of whom, I believe, were Mosby’s Rangers) and decided to jokingly say that they had captured the Gray Ghost. Within a few hours some TEN THOUSAND people raced from as far away as Washington hoping to see this figure of mystery! Of course, everyone laughed (or so we are told) when they learned that it was a joke!

V.P.

V. P.

Stuart, on the other hand, impressed Mosby with two things – his genius (Mosby pointed out that Stuart was also willing to not ‘go by the book’ – and his appearance. To the small, frail and physically unimpressive Mosby (who, by the way, was not an ugly man at all, but did not meet the standard of the day for masculine beauty), Stuart was a ‘young god’ with his physical size and strength and his outgoing and warm personality. Stuart became aware of Mosby when a conference was being held among the commanders and Stuart noted that Lee wanted to know more about the enemy’s movements and intentions. Mosby was with Jones as his adjutant and spoke up, saying that he would ‘go and find out’ for Stuart, which he did. Few people now realize the danger inherent in a scout’s actions. Although Mosby was always in uniform, often scouts found themselves captured and hanged as ‘spies’ anyway. Mosby was unafraid of the risk and, what’s more, was intelligent enough to ask for guides when he was not familiar with the territory. He was cool, capable and totally fearless, something that Stuart himself was. Indeed, one biographer said that the two men’s assessments of each other were equally valid for both.

Jones, according to Mosby, was a warm and protective towards the men under him, but constantly fought with those of equal and greater rank than himself, one of the reasons why Mosby’s was one of the few positive comments. Indeed, Jones’ abrasive treatment of his superiors – and the results thereof – were an object lesson for Mosby who also had little patience with ‘brass hats’ but knew how to temper his impatience with the necessary diplomacy. Had he not had Jones as an example of what NOT to do, he may have been far less successful in his own career.

V.P.

Mosby was one of the very few who regularly had nice to say about old Grumble. Believe me, they were few and far between. Thanks for the excellent input.

Eric

Jones drilled two companies, his own which he had named the Washington Mounted Rifles, and another from Marion. Jones was a stern disciplinarian whose orders were sprinkled liberally with oaths. He went about the lines of men, punching bellies and striking backs when they did not meet his expectation of perfection. Among his recruits was a frail little man, the smallest in both companies at 5 foot 1 inches (at the most) and weighing no more than about 120 pounds. Worse, the little fellow had stooped shoulders, the result of a sickly childhood and long years of study. Jones hounded the poor man mercilessly, thumping him between his shoulder blades every time he went by and bellowing in his ears “Straighten up, damn it! You’re slouching!” Yet he never seemed to ‘straighten up’ to Jones’ satisfaction.

Yet, before long, a bond formed between the rough, profane and stern soldier and the young misfit. This bond was fostered by the former’s recognition of the courage and intelligence of his unlikely recruit and the latter’s recognition of the skill and intelligence of his commander. Until Jones was ‘voted out’ of his command – leaving the frail soldier whom he had made his adjutant to resign before Jones’ replacement Fitz Hugh Lee removed him – their friendship was unbroken. Indeed, when Jones was given a small number of weapons – first carbines and then revolvers – one of each went to his little favorite. He told the rest of his men that the men to whom he gave the weapons would ‘always be put in a place of greatest danger’. And so it was.

Fortunately, for Jones’ little favorite, he had proven himself as an excellent scout to General JEB Stuart while still with Jones and after he was bereft of his commission and left to wonder what future he had under Fitz Lee who had no use for such an ‘unpromising soldier’, Stuart took him on as a scout where he served with great distinction and, in fact, became – as he had with Jones – an intimate friend of his commander. Indeed, it was he who brought Stuart the plan that led to the famous ‘Ride Around McClellan’ which made Stuart famous.

However, in December, 1862, faced with months of inactivity in winter quarters, Stuart’s leading little scout requested of his friend and commander that he be allowed to ‘stay behind’ in the area which he had heavily scouted and, with a few men, ‘see what could be done’ to discomfort the Yankees. Stuart, realizing that the young man enjoyed nothing of camp life – he didn’t flirt, play cards or enjoy ‘socializing’ – and suspecting that a few months of such an existence might make him lose his mind (he couldn’t sit still for more than ten minutes at a stretch), the gay Cavalier gave his consent and provided the young private soldier (who had no commission) some nine men telling him to ‘see what he could do’. Several weeks later, after capturing many times his number of men and horses and causing great consternation throughout the area, Stuart gave John Singleton Mosby an additional fifteen men and the glorious career of the famous Gray Ghost had begun.

But Mosby always gave the credit for his knowledge of cavalry tactics to William E. ‘Grumble’ Jones.

V.P.

It’s a waste of the paper it was published on.

Eric