Note: In a few moments a sound clip (Wav file) will play. It is from the 1956 movie, "The Searchers", featuring John Wayne. It echoes, almost verbatim, McCreary's words.(if your computer is not equiped with a sound card, please see the quote, spoken by Wayne, transcribed at the bottom of this page.
McCreary's problems did not end with the Ohio penitentiary. He was sent east to Ft. Delaware. Back home in Kentucky, McCreary's mother was dying. Her last wishes was for her son to be allowed to come home or atleast released from the sufferings of prison. McCreary' s father, Edmund, headed to Washington as he knew he had some family influence in addition to being a unionist himself.
--Dr. Edmund McCreary, to his son at Ft. Delaware Prison
With a parole obtained from President Lincoln, Edmund asked his son, " I do not ask you to desert your Cause. I only ask you to accept this parole which I have obtained from President Lincoln and to leave this country until cessation of hostilities. Col. McCreary replied, "Father, I took an oath to fight for the Confederate States of America until the war should be ended. It was not one month or six months, but the end of hostilities. Should I now accept this parole and go away it would be practical desertion of the Cause to which I have pledged my services, my honor, my life. Should the war end and I return to the State of Kentucky, I could never look again in the face of the thousand men that I led at Hartsville, Green River, Lebanon, Buffington Island, and through the States of Indiana and Ohio, nor could I ever face again these associates rendered near and dear to me as brothers by a common sacrifice and the common dangers through which we passed.
--James B. McCreary
Father, my heart is torn by these conflicting emotions. With deepest love for my mother and tenderest regard for your wishes I would do anything that honor does not forbid. My record as a soldier, for you and my mother, I dare not do this cowardly act. Do not press it on me. You would not love and respect me, and my mother would not love and respect me, and the world would say I was unworthy of the name of McCreary if I were to do this. I will go back and bear the privations that will come in this war, and if I die on the battlefield or in the hospital, I shall perish with the consciousness that I brought no shame upon my ancestry, my name, or my country."
--James B. McCreary, responding to his father at Ft. Delaware Prison
After Ft. Delaware, McCreary was sent to Morris Island, S.C. and was held with others as "human shields" in front of Union artillery emplacements that were shelling the city of Charleston. The Federals were mad that the Confederate government took the Union prisoners from the Georgia POW camps and put them with better conditions in the city of Charleston, which is where the yankees wanted to shell. In attempt to punish the Confederates for this act, Confederate prisoners of war were held as human shields. By an act of God, and the skill of Confederate gunners, no prisoners were hurt or killed by the incoming shells, the only casualties to shells were the Union soldier guards. These were not Union white soldiers but black soldiers of the famed 54th Mass., given this work as no white troops would want to serve under such conditions.
The Confederate casualities on the Island were not from shells but from shots fired by the guards at the prisoners, often with no justified reason. These Confederate POWs were given the title the "Immortal 600". After Morris Island, He was taken to Ft. Pulaski where many Confederates were intentionally starved to a point as close to death as possible. Although Col. McCreary was starved on Morris Island, he was for tunate to be one the last to get an exchange before conditions at Ft. Pulaski became extremely worse. Upon returning to Richmond, Virginia, McCreary testified before the Confederate Congress about the atrocities being committed upon Confederate soldiers i n the POW camps. During 1865, McCreary commanded a battalion under Gen. Breckinridge, composed of Kentuckians and South Carolinians in the Virginia theater. After Gen. Lee's surrender, his command dispersed and headed home. It should be also noted that when McCreary returned home in 1865, his mother lived to see him return and died with the knowledge her son was a patriot and man of honor.
In case the Wav file did not play for you, bearing John Wayne's voice, portraying "Ethan" in the movie, "The Searchers", it is: "Figure a mans only good for one oath at a time.... I took mine to the Confederate States of America."
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