The
coffin containing the remains was carried in the wagon. When it was
known in Memphis that Mrs. Gailor was going through the lines, a great
many people came to her with letters which they wished to send to
friends. Mrs. Gailor sewed many of the letters into the clothing of the
little boy. ("I remember it well," said the bishop. "I felt like a
mummy.") Also one of Forrest's spies came with important papers, asking
if she would undertake to deliver them. Only by very clever manipulation
did Mrs. Gailor get the papers through, for everything was carefully
searched. After they had passed out of the northern lines they met one
of Forrest's pickets. Mrs. Gailor told him that she had papers for the
general, and before long Forrest rode up with his staff and received
them. Then the two women and the little boy, with their tragic burden in
the wagon, drove along on their two-hundred mile journey. And later,
when Jackson was bombarded, they were there.
Before the war Major Gailor had been editor of the Memphis "Avalanche,"
a paper which was suppressed when the Union troops took the town. After
the War the "Avalanche" was started up again, and had a stormy time of
it, because it criticized a Carpet-bag judge who had come to Memphis. In
1889 the "Avalanche" was consolidated with the "Appeal," another famous
ante-bellum journal, surviving to-day in the "Commercial-Appeal," a
strong newspaper, edited by one of the ablest journalists in the South,
Mr.
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