Miles Carroll, Civil War Casualty

(From a 3-part series published in "SEEKING 'n SEARCHING ANCESTORS... July, August and September 1985 editions)​​

​During the Civil War years, not only did the American people fight the northern cause against the southern cause concerning the slavery question, but they also fought the political question of the older Democrat party against the newer Republican party.

Prior to his death (about 1984), I visited with Hite Boren, age 102 years, who lived in the small community of Hawkeye in Pulaski County and I drew important information from his marvelous storehouse of memories. He could remember, when a child, that all the Civil War comrades would meet at his father's house and spend all night talking about their experiences during the war years and those following. As a wide-eyed child, he absorbed all those wonderful tales of yesteryear and could recite the most exciting stories! He said the Southerners were mostly Democrat in their political beliefs and the Union Army represented Abraham Lincoln and the newer Republican party. The South had a guerilla army called bushwhackers and they terrorized the countryside with their unscrupulous and deadly behavior.

Miles and Ruah (Setzer/Setser) Carroll, with their family of 10 children lived in southern Miller County near the old Madden community. They were new settlers to this region when the Civil War broke out, having come from Macon Co., Northern Carolina, via Georgia, in the late 1850s. A huge wagon train of 44 wagons made this trek to central Missouri with many settlers making a new home for themselves in our Miller/Pulaski counties area. Some of the family names included Carroll, Boren, Setser, Steen Day, Strutton and Lowery. All those pioneer families came overland with their livestock, trudging the hundreds of miles through the autumn rains, behind wagons loaded with their earthly possessions. The wagon train increased in size as it proceeded westward through Tennessee, Kentucky, and onward to Missouri.

Uncle Hite Boren reconstructed the Madden and Hawkeye communities for me during the Civil War years. The following were the homesteaders who lived in that general region during the 1860s…there was Thomas Day; the Miles Carroll family down by the Tavern Creek; Ab(ner) Long; Jack Long, Nick Long; Jack Thompson; Sol(omon) Keeth; Peter Whittle; Dow Wall; 'ol man Rutter who was a preacher; Willis Lively; Elias Popplewell; George Steen's folks; Jack Atkins; a feller named Arnold; Thomas Thornsberry; John Thornsberry, Will Pemberton; the Lowerys; and Jim Boren. Also in the same area were the Pennsylvanians who migrated to Miller County in the same time era…the Tallmans, Browns, Moores, Pitingers, Getgens, Irlands, Bennages, and Johnstons. Southern Miller County was peopled by pioneers of very different backgrounds.

The northern Pennsylvania Dutch were Republicans and non-slave owners while the southern homesteaders, of varied backgrounds, were accustomed to a life of slave ownership. Joseph Carroll, whom I believe was a brother to Miles, owned one slave in 1862 and James Long owned one. Both men lived near each other in the old Madden community.

Uncle Hite was of the opinion, and I am sure he heard this quoted by his father many times as he grew up, that many central Missouri men went into the service of the Union Army even though their hearts may have been with the Confederacy. They were able to acquire food and provisions for their wives and children from the Federal army and evidently the same was not available from the southern armies.

Miles Carroll was a native of North Carolina, born 11 April 1811. At the age of 23, in 1834, he married Ruah L. Setser/Setser, daughter of John and Catherine (Tarr) Setzer, born in Lincoln County, North Carolina on 26 August 1811. From 1834 until c/1843, they lived in Macon County, North Carolina where their first 4 children were born including Narcissa, Mary/Polly, Lucinda, and Henry. After moving to Georgia, 5 more children were born: Martha, John, Levada, Daniel and William. Their 10th child, Cordelia Jane, was born in Missouri.

Two of the Carroll sons, Henry, about 18 years old, and John, not yet 16, went off to war joining the Union forces of the North. They were young boys who wanted to fight a war that I doubt they even understood! The Civil War was a terrible time in our history. There will never be an accurate count of how many actually died in the 4 years between 1861 and1865, but the estimated number is horrendous. The violence during those years was terrible as neighbor fought neighbor; family fought family; and it was described as the time when brother fought brother. Little trust could be found and everyone was skeptical of his neighbor.

The story has been told through the generations about the death of Miles Carroll. The translation has probably either lost some truth or perhaps gained some over the years as the legend has survived for over 125 years since a day in October, 1864 when death overtook Miles Carroll. The following is what Hite Boren told me as he remembered the story his father, Jim Boren, told him when a child…

Miles was 53 years old and too old to serve in the military, but his two oldest sons were away fighting for the North. IT was rumored the boys sent money home to their folks for safekeeping. Bushwhackers rode roughshod, spreading fear and havoc over the countryside of central Missouri. One autumn day they rode to the homestead of Miles Carroll and demanded money. He refused to hand any over to them, so they took Miles and marched him in front of their horses for miles, then returned him home, weary and worn out. They left at that time, but returned again about 2 weeks later and this time they dragged him from his house and shot him down in the front yard of his home. Two of his daughters, Martha Carroll Shelton and Narcissa Carroll Strutton, were home and witnessed the murder of their father. The bushwhackers terrorized the women also, telling them if they attempted to moved the body of their father, they would burn the house down. They rode off and a short while later, Ruah and two other Carroll daughters, Lucinda Lowery and Polly Smith, returned home to the frightful sight. The five women had just brought Miles into the house when the bushwhackers returned. With an ax in hand, Ruah challenged the outlaws, daring them to set foot in her house. Evidently she made believers of them because they rode away. The five women buried Miles Carroll on a hillside overlooking the Big Tavern Creek Valley below, the first person buried in the Madden Cemetery. It is my understanding there are approximately 30 Civil War veterans buried in Madden Cemetery, including James Monroe Smith, husband of Polly Carroll Smith. He was killed in a gunfight on the streets of Iberia a few years after the Civil War had ended, but the fight was because of old hatreds stemming from the war. James Monroe Smith was a brother to my great-grandfather, William Harrison Smith, sons of John Wesley Smith and Nancy Stinnett Smith.

I do not know for sure how the Grand Army of the Republic Post in Iberia acquired the name MILES CARROLL G.A.R. POST NO. 111, but I would assume that Squire John Ferguson was instrumental in getting the post named for his old friend. The grand old gentleman of Richwoods Township, Squire Ferguson, was the cornerstone of the G.A.R. in southern Miller County and was very influential in the community.

Many descendants of Miles and Ruah (Setser) Carroll are scattered throughout the world today and many are yet in our Mid-Missouri region in both Miller and Pulaski counties. The children married into the families of Smith, Strutton, Lowery, Shelton, Hull, Long, Coffey, and Martin, who are also pioneer families with deep roots in our community.

The rugged stories of our ancestors are wonderful to research and we realize these pioneer forefathers were a strong people as they set out to conquer a brutal frontier. Missouri was considered an "untamed land" prior to and during the Civil War era and it took courageous people to tackle such a ruthless wilderness, settle it, and build an everlasting heritage for our generations of the 20th Century.