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bang, bang went the guns about 40 rods up the road and they kept a going all excited. Prichard ordered us to fall in. We did and went up the road... Then we formed in line and then we went into the fight. I fell in behind a pine tree. I had fired two shots and was putting a
load in my gun when they hollered cease firing. You are firing on your own men. We had two killed and three wounded. They proved to be the 1st Wisconsin and
the 1st Ohio. They had seven wounded and then we went back to camp... Some of the boys was getting
a barrel out of a wagon. They called for me to help
and it proved to be a barrel of whiskey. We soon
made a hole in it and I was filling my canteen when
Frank Carpenter came rushing out. ‘Say Bill, we have
got old Jeff ’ and I spoke up, ‘Hell we have’ and said,
‘Where is he?’ Right where the crowd is. I rushed up,
there he was. The same old man that was in the tent
with the women... Just at this time someone touched
me on the shoulder. I turned around to see who it was
and it was Charlie Tyler. ‘Bill, John Hines has been killed.’
I spoke up and said, ‘My God, is that so. Where is he?’‘He
was over where we formed in line a fighting. He was shot
in the mouth, come right out the back of his head.’ Captain Hudson just rode up and he says take out what things he has in his pockets. We took out Jeff Davis revolver, the one Jeff gave him when he surrendered and his pocket book and some other trinkets. We spread his blanket over him saying we would come back and get him... I do not know what took place in
our camp after we went away only what they tell. But some of them said that when we was fighting with the 1st Wisconsin that Jeff tried to get away.
Prichard had put a guard around the camp.
Mrs. Davis stepped out of the tent asked if they would allow her mother to go down to the brook and get a pail of water. The brook was about 4 rods
from the tent and the guard said yes. As he (Jeff) walked out he had on a riding dress and shawl over his head, he looked like an old woman. As he walked along his spurs picked up his dress behind him and showed his boots and the guard stopped him and made him back to
the tent”. A copy of the Linsley story is included with the provenance folder.
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Rossbacher’s research provides several incredible primary accounts of the Jefferson Davis revolver, No. 40568 including a newspaper article in the Detroit Free Press less than a month after its surrender stating, “Major Hudson brought with him Jeff Davis’ pistol, now on exhibition at Mr. S. Smiths. It is an elegant silver plated instrument, costing about $45. The case contains the initials J. D. together with the letter of the admiring donor, a gift from a friend, the maker of the pistol in London, altogether forming a delicate morsel and most significant exhibition of British ‘Neutrality.’” This description certainly matches the engraved, silver-plated and British-made Adams Revolver from the Hines family. Location of the case and letter have been lost to time.
A second newspaper article in The Michigan Argus, February 1875 describes Edwin Hines as still owning “a silver mounted revolver, taken by him, from Jefferson Davis at the time of his capture. The revolver is a self-cocker and originally cost $100.” It further states Hines had been offered $1000 for the property. Again, a silver-plated and now the more descriptive “self-cocking” revolver matches the Hines family gun, the Adams being a double-action.
A third article from The Alma Record on Friday, June 25, 1886 reported that “One of the revolvers upon the person of Jeff Davis, when he
was captured, is in the possession of Edwin Hines, a Grass Lakes soldier.”
An included eye-witness account as related by William Linsley (also of the 4th Michigan) was submitted to, and
published by the “Then and Now Historical Society” in Dorr, Michigan by Mrs. Ann VandenBerg, a direct descendant of Private Linsley, and provides the most compelling
affirmation of the Hines story with great accuracy:
“We were in the pine woods. We charged about 20 rods and came right into camp.
John Hines and Charlie Tyler and myself went into a tent
and no one was up in this tent there was one man and two women.
The old man rose up to see what was going on. ‘I surrender’ he said and reached down in the bed
and got a revolver and handed it to John Hines. We
did not know who they were and some of the boys knew who
they were after and this proved to be Jefferson Davis and the women
proved to be his wife and sister. We did not know it at the time we
went out of the tent. Just as we got into the road