THE BOX

John King Terry and wife Mary Ann

My father, Roy D. Terry, told me this story about his grandfather John King Terry.  During the Civil War John joined the Union Forces and his wife went to live with her family at a nearby farm.  

John served with a Capt. John Kelso, whom he much respected, and would later name a son for the man.  Out on patrol  hunting marauders, John recognized they were near his in-laws house.  He offered his captain and men a home cooked meal and rest for the horses.  They quickly agreed and set off.

Unknown to John, the mauraders had already hit the home of the inlaws (who had run away to remain hidden in the nearby woods).  The marauders had made off with many of the few remaining valuables of the family. They had taken a wooden box John had once kept ammunition in and had scooped up the family's silver spoons and valuables from their ancestors.  They had then ridden off when alerted to the approaching soldiers.

Seeing the family safe, John and the men immdediately set off trailing the thieves and trapped them in a cave.  The command was given to 'Fire until there is no reason to fire anymore.'   The goods of the Terry and Riddle families were recovered - along with valuables from other homes nearby. 

The box went on to serve the family for many years, and came to my father as a keepsake.  During the 1930's in the Ozarks times were very hard and one family down the road could not even afford a coffin when their small baby died.  My father gave them the box- once used to carry off a family treasure - in order for it to once more hold a family's small treasure taken too soon.

 Somewhere in the hills of Barry Co., Missouri a small wooden box from one family holds the remains of another family.  The names are gone but the story remains.

Marilyn A.  Hudson

Civil War Veteran: John King Terry

John King Terry :Civil War Veteran

John was farming in Barry Co., Missouri, when the war broke out in 1861. John could obviously see the ‘writing on the wall’ concerning upcoming events and was enrolled on 24 March (near Cassville) of that same year. He was a private in Company “M”, 8th Regiment and Company “H”, 14th Regiment of the Missouri State Militia Cavalry Volunteers. For most of that time he served a company blacksmith. At the time of his discharge on 18 April 1865 he was described as being : “5’11” high…[with] dark hair….and hazel eyes.”

At one point he serve under Captain John Kelso; a federal officer noted in the War of the Rebellion record series as a man who received many field promotions over the course of the conflict. He may be the man in charge when the company John was with recovered the items stolen from his in-laws farm by bushwhackers (see The Box), since Kelso’s reports describe several incidents that may relate to this event. As a lieutenant, Kelso wrote a report dated 25 July 1862 that did mention Company “H” of the 14th Missouri State Militia.

A report of 5 August 1862 by a Captain Milton Burch, 14 Missouri Cavalry noted that Kelso had been put in charge of the Company “H”. Yet another report by Burch, 13 November 1862, contained a report of just one of many instances where Kelso and men pursued rebels through the hills of southwest Missouri.

Following his discharge in 1865, he lived for two years, according to family legend in Newton County, Missouri. The family then returned to Barry Co., Missouri, where they would remain for the rest of their lives. When John went to war, he was the father of one child, William G., who died in September of 1863. His mother, Mary Ann Reed Terry wrote in a letter of 1867 that John “is married…[they] have five children, four boys and one girl. The oldest boy is dead, the next is twins….”

Sources:
National Archives and Records Center, Washington, D.C. John K. Terry, Private, Application #601.473.Co.H.8th Missouri Militia Cavalry (Volunteers). Case files approved pension applications veterans who served in the Army and Navy in the Civil war…;Records group 15, Records of the Veterans Administration.

War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official records of the United States and Confederate Armies (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1901).

WAR IS HELL ON EVERYBODY

The family of Martin and Mary Ann Reed Terry had just migrated from northern Arkansas into Barry Co., Missouri when the Civil war, almost literally, exploded in their back yard. Where they had recently left armies were surging northward. The northern forces were moving down from the north and the east.

The family, like most of the region, was now dogged by hardship and sorrow over the next few years. The war struck hard taking both lands and lives. Martin and his family fled their home 23 July 1861 as troops massed in the area just north of Barry Co., Mo. All around the area of their old Arkansas home, and the friends and family still there, the war raged. Battles such as "Pea Ridge", "Wilson's Creek", "Prairie Grove", and "Carthage" meant that they lived as refugees scurrying back and forth trying to keep out of the way of both sides.

September saw Martin and family in northeast Missouri trying to escape the sweeping ravages of war. However, the large numbers of homeless families and moving soldiers had left in their wake a different kind of killing field. A battlefield where illness and not bullets took an awful toll on the family:

"We left home July 23 and stopt in Casconde County 40 miles from her the 19 of Sept. There we was nearly all sick and William and Henderson died William on the 9 of October and Henderson on the 16 of November and the fever settled in your mother's rite eye and it went out. Our disease was considered low typhus. We had the best medical help the country could afford, but no human help could avail. William said tell friends I die in view of a blissful immortality and that is worth all the world to me and Henderson said he trusted the savior and was not afraid to die and he expected to get to heaven and we have a sweet hope that they are forever at rest. We came up here yesterday with the intention of going on to Springfield but in view of everything we think it not to be the best at this time. We have been on the wear and tear ever since we left home and like many others we are pretty well ruined. We yet have our wagon and 4 head of horses and a yoke of cattle whether we stay here or come up to Springfield or go on to Ioway I know not. We should be glad to hear from you and our little [touch of home?] there what became of it. These are the times that try mens soles be faithful to the grace given." --Martin Terry, writing from Rollo, Phelps Co., Mo to his son John King Terry, dated 3 April 1862.

Martin would later settled back into Barry Co., Mo, serving even as a justice of the peave in Capps Creek Township beginning in July 1866. Martin Terry died 2 Feb. 189 in Barry Co., Mo. and was buried in the Arnhart Cemetery located near the hamlet of Purdy. His wife, Mary Ann Reed Terry died three years later on 3 July 1893.

[Hudson, Marilyn A. Terry Trails. 1995; unpublished manuscript. Permission to use transcribed letters 1994, Ruth Terry Preston to Marilyn A. Hudson]

P.P. Brown wearing G.A.R. Medal of membership

Grand Army of the Republic Civil War Veterans Organization.

Ptolemy Philadelphus Brown (son of Isaac H. Brown and Mary Brown) was born August 30, 1829 in Warren County, TN, and died November 02, 1903 in St. James, MO. He married Martha Ann Womack on February 07, 1850 in Warren County, TN, daughter (?) of Burgess Harrelson Womack and Sarah Webb. Family legend states he was opposed to slavery and that placed him in opposition to his wife's family and led to a disenfranchisement of them with her family. He served in the Civil War while living in northern Arkansas and may have been a scout. It is said in a letter that the Confederates has a rope ready if they ever caught him.
He signed the letter in "F.C. and L" significant to the G.A.R.

Children of Ptolemy Philadelphus Brown and Martha Ann Womack are:
+Mary Lavonia Brown, b. November 09, 1850, Warren County, TN, d. October 08, 1945, Phelps County, MO.
+Burgess Franklin Brown, b. August 05, 1854, TN, d. January 19, 1942, Hutchinson, KS
+Sarah Lavinia BROWN,
+Isaac Denton BROWN,
+Harold Lycurgus BROWN,
+George Mithrio BROWN,
+Clinton Marcellus BROWN,
+Felix Grundy BROWN


A note about the name: The name from records and family records is "Ptolemy Philadelphus" and he was named for the famous Roman. Many of the children of Issac Brown bear strikingly classical names indicating the family was well-educated and well read.

John King Terry Grave Barry Co.,MO