On May 14 1863, a scout galloped up to the headquarters
of General Ulysses S. Grant and his chief aide General William T. Sherman,
on the outskirts of Jackson, Mississippi. In the scout's hand was a fresh
copy of a newspaper, the print still drying on the page. Grant and Sherman
read the pages with annoyance, yet were jubilant at the prospect of finally
capturing this particular 'secesh' newspaper, since it had eluded them
twice before. Orders were issued immediately to ensure that the staff and
presses of this newspaper, the "hornet's nest of the Rebellion," were to
be quickly seized. But much to the embarassment of Grant and Sherman, their
capture was foiled once more, as the fugitive newspaper escaped just ahead
of their clutches.
Though not an official branch of the military, wartime would be unthinkable
without them. Often responsible for boosting the morale of the soldiers
and loved ones at home, and reporting intelligence to the commanders, the
newspaper was essential during the Civil War. Generals on both sides found
it to contain more accurate information about a specific battle than the
official reports. Mothers, wives and sweethearts depended on them in an
effort to keep up with their loved ones' whereabouts. But during wartime,
being on the staff of a newspaper could be a dangerous job, especially
if you were constantly trying to stay one step ahead of capture. Such is
the amazing and sometimes comical story of the "Memphis Appeal."
At the onset of the Civil War, the Appeal was the largest daily
newspaper in Tennessee with a circulation of 2,000. The paper had originally
been founded in 1840, when Colonel Henry Van Pelt took over a weekly called
"The Western World and Memphis Banner of the Constitution." He renamed
it the "Appeal" and relocated it to a large building in downtown
Memphis. With Van Pelt's death in 1851, it fell to the co-editorship of
Colonels John R. McClanahan and Benjamin Franklin Dill, and it loyally
supported Stephen A. Douglas for president in 1860. When the Democrats
split over the issue of slavery, the Appeal advocated compromise
to hold the Union together. But when secession was inevitable, it threw
its full support behind the newly formed Confederate States.
So supportive was the Appeal that half of its newspaper staff
of about twenty enlisted in a unit of artillery called the Appeal Battery.
Recruited and equipped by the newspaper in early '62, this unit fought
with distinction at Corinth and Vicksburg.
In the Spring of that same year (1862), the city of Memphis was in a
precarious situation. Flush with victories at Shiloh and Corinth, the western
Union army attacked Memphis by river with eight ironclads. After a desperate
attempt to defend Memphis, the city was forced to surrender on June 6th.
Earlier that morning, however, the Appeal's presses and equipment
were loaded onto a boxcar. By the time the Confederates surrendered, the
newspaper and staff were safely on their way to Grenada, Mississippi, 100
miles to the south. It wasn't as if the Yankees shouldn't have seen this
coming, since the Appeal had warned them a month earlier, declaring:
"...sooner would we sink our types, press and establishment into the bottom
of the Mississippi River and become wandering exiles from our homes, than
continue publication under Union occupation..."
Reaching their new home in Grenada, the paper began publication three
days later. The first issue avowed that "...so long as two or three states
are gathered together in the name of the Confederate States, so long will
we be found advocating, as zealously as ever, a continued resistance to
the tyranny which a haughty foe is endeavoring to establish over us..."
With Grant's forces on the move again, the Appeal was forced
to look for another home, publishing their farewell edition in Grenada
on November 29, 1862. Off they went, heavy presses and staff, southeast
another 100 miles to the city of Jackson, Mississippi..
In Jackson, Colonel McClanahan boldy hung the sign: "Memphis Headquarters"
above his room at the Bowman House. To another newspaper refugee correspondent
of the Knoxville "Daily Register," the colonel claimed the move
had been planned months earlier.
During the bleak month of December, the Appeal was forced to
reduce its number of columns due to a shortage of ink and fuel for the
presses. Shoe blacking was obtained from the army commissary to replace
the ink, and in late January publishing returned to normal -- until the
arrival of Grant and Sherman on May 14th.
Loading up the presses once more on a flatboat, the Appeal barely
managed to cross the Pearl River ahead of the Yankee troops. An Appeal
pressman, Andy Harmon, recalled later, "We...had just made the trip,
when the Bluecoats reached the other bank. They had nothing to cross on
so they took it out in cussing us, and we gave 'em back as good as they
sent. There's a heap of men, who feel mighty brave when they've got a big
river between them and the other fellows." After a long and round-about
journey by rail and river, the fugitive newspaper finally came to rest
in Atlanta, Ga., some 400 miles from Memphis.
On June 6 1863, exactly one year from its exile, the Appeal published
its first issue from the Atlanta office. The newspaper was allowed to rest
here for a year, and found itself in the company of nine other newspapers,
two of these being refugees, the Knoxville "Daily Register" and
the Chattanooga "Daily Rebel."
The Appeal's circulation had now increased to a circulation of
14,000, with the combined morning and evening editions. Familiar was the
newsboy's cry, "Paper! Paper! Come get your paper! Fresh off the presses,
the Memphis-Grenada-Jackson-Meridian-Atlanta Appeal!"
With the South's defeats at Vicksburg and Chattanooga, the city of Atlanta
was to be an inevitable target for the Union Army. And so on June 20, 1864,
just hours before Sherman began shelling the city, the Appeal published
its last Atlanta issue. The paper's largest press was then loaded on a
boxcar bound for Montgomery, Alabama, but the proof press was mounted on
a dray and continued running off news sheets for the valiant Rebel soldiers
in the rifle pits until September 2, 1864. Sherman stated in his report
that "...all newspapers have quit Atlanta except the Memphis Appeal;
that, I suppose, is tired of moving and wants to be let alone..."
Sherman had underestimated the newspaper, which successfully reached
Montgomery, Alabama and began publication on September 20. But they, like
many of their beloved soldiers to the cause, were not allowed a peaceful
existence.
On April 9, 1865, General Lee surrendered his army in Virginia. Word
of the surrender was slow to reach Montgomery, which surrendered to Major
General James Wilson's cavalry on April 13th. However, once again the paper
was just ahead of its captors, crossing the Chattahoochie River to Columbus,
Georgia. But Wilson's troopers were hot on the trail, and three days later
Columbus surrendered, with the Appeal now surrounded. Some of the
newspaper's staffers, along with the faithful press, managed to escape
to Macon, but the proof press and other equipment were smashed, and Dill
was captured and taken before General Wilson.
General Wilson and his engineering officer were pouring over maps when
an aide burst in and loudly announced: "Allow me to introduce to you, Sir,
Colonel Benjamin F. Dill, Editor of the Memphis Appeal." General
Wilson jumped to his feet and cried out: "Have we caught the old fox at
last? Well I'll be damned!" There followed much laughter, backslapping,
and drinking of whiskey among captors and captured. General Wilson then
had Dill sign an agreement, or risk imprisonment, pledging not to publish
for the duration of the war. Unknown to Wilson, the document was meaningless
since the war had ended one week before.
Appeal staffers who escaped capture in Columbus or who were released
later slowly made their way back to Memphis. After Dill's release, he arranged
for the Hoe press to be transported, by river, from it's hiding place in
Macon, back to Memphis. Harmon, the pressman, and the same press that had
rolled almost continuously throughout the war, eventually made it back
to Memphis too, by way of Mobile and New Orleans. And on November 5, 1865,
the press rolled once more in Memphis, announcing the Memphis Appeal
was back in business.
An editorial in that memorable edition stated: "If the Appeal erred
in obeying the impulse that throbbed as from one impassioned heart throughout
the South, it may claim to have some expiation in the sacrifices it has
endured during its three years of self-exile... We frankly and truly accept
the interpretation that has been stamped with the red verdict of war on
the Constitution, of the indestructibility of the Union of States and people
which makes us, for all time, a mighty and indivisible Republic."
*During the war, many newspapers kept an account of the wanderings of
the Appeal and amused themselves at its expense. The great Albert
Roberts, by then editor of the Nashville Banner, stated: "Nothing
in newspaperography can compare with [the Appeal's] strange, eventful career."
Though the faithful Hoe Press was retired seven years later, the paper,
renamed the Memphis Commercial Appeal in 1894, remains in circulation
today in Memphis, Tn., and hasn't moved since.
