McCLURE, Thomas Wesley
Thomas Wesley McClure
Source: Beckwith, H. W. History of Fountain County, Indiana. Chicago: HH Hill, 1881. p 129
Indiana was represented among the seventy brave men under Major Anderson, in Fort Sumter, April 18, 1861. A native of Fountain county was among the few survivors of the Fort Pillow massacre, April 12, 1864. T. W. McClure was born in Wabash township, Fountain county, Indiana, October 4, 1833. His father, from Kentucky, settled in that township in 1824. Young McClure learned the cabinet-maker's trade in Covington. In 1858 he removed to Wabash city, Indiana. On May 30, 1860, he was married in Covington to Miss Ann E. Silver. He enlisted in the 14th reg. Ind. Vols. in 1861, and was sent to the front, reaching Shiloh April 8, 1862, the day after the battle. In 1863 McClure, J. D. Hill and Wm. Smith were requested-not detailed-by Gen. Dodge to recruit among the freed men, at that time a most disgraceful as well as dangerous service. They were very successful, for the negroes were loyal to a man, and in Col. Phillips' raid to Grenada, Mississippi, hundreds of brave black men enlisted, anxious to fight for the old flag. McClure was first lieutenant in the 1st Alabama Siege Artillery. When Sherman began his march to the sea, 500 men -one half freedmen, and the rest, for the most, loyal southerners-were left at Fort Pillow. Gen. Forest, with 5,000 rebels, attacked this little band, who, after a brave defense and the loss of some twenty-five men, surrendered. But their surrender was not accepted, and a horrid, premeditated massacre resulted. Not more than sixty men escaped death. Some of them were badly wounded, and some were taken aside and shot down. McCluer was spared chiefly because he was from the north. But when taken in charge by a soldier to whom he gave himself up, he heard Forest say, with an oath, "My orders were to kill every one of them, but you have taken them prisoners, and I want you to treat them as prisoners. " Then taking off his hat he waved it, exclaiming, "We can now proclaim that the Mississippi is ours. " After this to the end of the war McClure was a prisoner, and saw the sad sights over which humanity shudders, and which Christian charity would conceal and forgive. He passed through Cahaba, Andersonville, Macon and Savannah. At Charleston, with 500 prisoners, he was placed under the shell of our own guns, fired from Morris Island. At length, through the heroic efforts of his wife, he was paroled February 20, 1865, and reached home on the 15th of March. McClure was one of the 208,367 men Indiana sent forth to maintain the honor of our flag. Brave men all of them! And as we make this little tribute to the peculiar merits of one of them, not a leaf shall be taken from the laurels of the rest. Their memory shall be cherished and honored while the Union last. And may it be perpetual.
Contributed by Rev. John M. Bishop