The Turnbo Manuscripts
by Silas Claiborne Turnbo
1844-1925
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By S. C. Turnbo
There were many little things done in war days that seemingly were tame affairs, yet they are worth mentioning. Among these small incidents is one which Clabe Mahan furnished me, who said that he was quite small while the war was going on, but said he, "There is one little incident occurred in my presence that is still fresh in my mind. After my father Isaac Mahan left our home on Little North Fork and moved up near Rome in Douglas County, Missouri, a small boy was living with us of the name of Isaac Robertson. This boy owned a brand new hat which was not common for boys to have in those turbulent days. One day a large body of cavalry, while passing our house one of the men noticing young Robertson with a new hat on stopped at the yard gate and says "Little boy, let me see your hat." and the boy not thinking of anything wrong being done to him walked across the yard to the gate where the soldier was on his horse, and before the unsuspecting child had time to hand him his hat which he was going to do for him to look at, the man reached over the fence and snatched the hat off of the boy’s head and pitched his old worn-out hat over into the yard and galloped off leaving the poor boy in mute astonishment. My brother Sam Mahan, who was also a little fellow, was standing under a small tree and one of the men pretended to shoot at him to frighten him and did shoot off a small :Limb just over his head, which soared Sam nearly to death. At the same time some of the men stopped and went into our house and took all the milk we had and Betsey Ann, one of my little sisters, began to cry for milk and one of the men who had a cup full of milk says, "Here, little girl, I will give my part of the milk back to you."
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